Best broadband in Edinburgh

Customers looking at superfast deals will find Vodafone is the cheapest and offer no-frills budget broadband to customers in the Scottish capital.

On the gigabit-capable side, Virgin Media's speeds are unparalleled, although there is good competition from Hyperoptic and Vodafone where the services are available.

Ultimately, the best broadband option in Edinburgh depends on a household's circumstances - and how much they're willing to pay.

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Best broadband packages in Edinburgh

Thanks to the variety of broadband packages available in Edinburgh, there's something for everyone.

Here are our highlights:

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Fastest broadband in Edinburgh

Winner: Virgin Media's Gig1 is difficult to beat, although they may not be the cheapest option available.

Edinburgh has excellent coverage from Virgin Media's cable network delivering broadband speeds of up to 1130Mb since July 2020.

Along with Virgin Media, gigabit-capable broadband is also available on the Openreach and CityFibre networks with BT, EE and Vodafone among the providers on offer in certain locations. Hyperoptic also have some coverage across the city.

Here are some headline deals:

In terms of sheer speed, Virgin is the best provider in Edinburgh, but that's only one part of the story with several providers offering cheaper deals.

Let's take a closer look at gigabit-capable broadband coverage in Edinburgh.

Gigabit coverage in Edinburgh

There are more gigabit options in Edinburgh than we find in many other places - as the capital city of Scotland, it's attracted decent investment from multiple sources.

Virgin Media coverage in the City of Edinburgh is at 84.31% according to the latest data from Think Broadband. As we can see when we look at this coverage on a map, it covers large swathes of the city:

The problem with Virgin Media's rollout is that it tends to miss houses and streets that are difficult to get to - and this can mean homes may miss out on connections when their neighbours can sign up to Vigin's services. We've got more on Virgin's availability in this guide and we'd always recommend checking before getting too excited about the idea of 1130Mb broadband from the provider.

Openreach has also been rolling out their fibre to the premises (FTTP) network in areas across Edinburgh. They confirmed 80,000 premises had been passed by July 2020 in:

• Abbeyhill
• Corstorphine
• Davidson's Mains
• Newington
• Fairemilehead
• Fountainbridge
• Colinton
• Liberton
• Granton
• Leith
• Morningside
• Stockbridge
• Craiglockhart
• Portobello

On another Think Broadband map, we can see how their rollout is progressing:

Note: The green dots denote Openreach G.fast technology. Read our guide on ultrafast broadband for more information about that.

Think Broadband estimate 45.49% of homes in the City of Edinburgh have access to Openreach FTTP while 15.49% have access to Openreach G.fast.

BT and EE use the Openreach network in Edinburgh as well as others including TalkTalk and Sky.

However, another popular ultrafast provider Vodafone uses the CityFibre gigabit-capable network to deliver services. This is far less widespread and launched in the following areas in February 2020:

• Balerno
• Restalrig
• Liberton

Here's a map to illustrate current coverage:

Finally, Hyperoptic are expanding their network building-by-building in Edinburgh. They have a growing collection of apartment buildings also taking orders or with installations agreed, while residents in hundreds of other buildings have registered their interest.

Their coverage is indicated on the map below:

As the pricing table above suggests, Hyperoptic are often one of the cheapest ultrafast broadband providers around, but their limited coverage around Edinburgh means their services are only available to a few.

Find out more about Hyperoptic broadband.

Social housing upgrades

Two schemes have been confirmed in recent years to ensure social tenants can access full fibre broadband.

Following wrangling over a wayleave agreement, CityFibre and the City of Edinburgh Council finally came to an understanding in November 2019 which added around 19,000 social housing properties to their rollout in partnership with Vodafone.

Before this, there was no agreement in place to ensure social housing tenants were part of the rollout, so the decision was welcome.

In addition, it was announced in July 2020 that Hyperoptic had reached an agreement with LinkLiving and Link Housing to deploy their broadband to young adults who are working to get their lives back on track after homelessness.

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Cheapest broadband in Edinburgh

Winner: Vodafone are the cheapest fibre broadband provider in Edinburgh - but deals change regularly.

Superfast broadband is available to 99% of homes in the City of Edinburgh, so most customers will have access to the superfast speeds offered by major broadband providers including Plusnet, Shell Energy Broadband and others.

Here are some of the cheapest fibre broadband deals in Edinburgh:

All the providers listed above are budget broadband options, so there are few extras available from them.

Superfast fibre is a highly competitive area and providers always run special offers to try and attract new customers. Keep an eye on our broadband comparison tables for the latest deals.

No contract fibre broadband options

Now TV is one of those rare suppliers who allow customers to take 1-month fibre broadband contracts - Direct Save Telecom are another, although their 1-month package is expensive:

As we can see, it costs more to take Direct Save's 35Mb package on a monthly rolling contract than it does to take Now TV's faster 63Mb deal, although the set-up costs for Now TV are higher.

Find out more about no-contract fibre broadband.

Another benefit of Now TV is their free inclusive calls, a definite rarity among broadband providers these days who favour add-ons rather than inclusive landline minutes.

Cheapest standard broadband in Edinburgh

While many households opt for fibre broadband these days, there are good deals available in Edinburgh for those happy with standard copper broadband:

Again, there's little difference between these four budget providers, apart from the free inclusive calls offered by Now TV. That may be the tipping point for potential customers.

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Best for home phone

Winner: Now offer inclusive anytime calls with their broadband.

Few broadband providers offer inclusive minutes anymore, as fewer households are choosing to make good use of their landline.

As we've already mentioned, Now's inclusive calls makes them stand out from their rivals:

Other providers offer evening and weekend calls with some plans such as John Lewis Broadband and Virgin Media, but Now offer the most comprehensive plan.

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Best for TV

Winner: Virgin Media combine the fastest speeds with a good TV service.

Thanks to the presence of Virgin Media in the city, TV lovers in Edinburgh have plenty of options to bundle together broadband and TV.

These are the cheapest traditional pay TV and broadband bundles packages available from the different providers in Edinburgh:

As is plain from the table, Sky offer the most comprehensive pay TV service, and this becomes more evident when we look at some of the extra channel packs:

So, the customisation options with Sky TV are impressive, allowing customers to build packages that suit them from a relatively low base price.

Here are more of Sky's broadband and TV options:

Read more about Sky TV deals.

Virgin Media like to encourage customers to take specific broadband packages with specific broadband packages but, in reality, each TV bundle can be bundled with various broadband options through a customisation process at checkout.

Here are more of their bundle options:

Read our guide to Virgin's TV deals.

BT TV operates a selection of deals based on Now TV passes and these can be combined with their fibre broadband plans for customers in Edinburgh and beyond.

Here are some examples with broadband and TV together:

Because BT's base broadband packages are so pricey, their TV packages seem far more expensive than comparable ones from Sky and Virgin.

Learn more about BT TV.

Overall, Edinburgh broadband customers are likely to be well served by Virgin Media's ultrafast 1GB broadband and their TV service. Sky's ultrafast broadband tops out at 500Mb right now, so even those in areas where the Openreach FTTP network is available won't be able to combine gigabit speeds with Sky TV - if they want to take broadband and TV from the same provider.

Sky TV can be taken on its own, so it could theoretically be combined with Virgin Media broadband if customers are happy to have two separate contracts. However, Virgin Media TV must be taken alongside Virgin broadband, so bear that in mind.

Customers who don't want to be tied to a contract might want to look at streaming options like Now TV, Amazon Prime Video and Netflix - we've compared all three.

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Verdict: who's best for broadband in Edinburgh?

Overall choice: Virgin Media - for their ultrafast coverage in Edinburgh, offering the fastest speeds and the option to bundle TV.

For superfast broadband, Vodafone are the cheapest option in Edinburgh and customers can also get ultrafast services from them in some part of the city too.

We like them because:

• They strive to be the cheapest for superfast
• Faster packages are Pro deals with extra premium features
• Their customer service record is improving

On the other hand, their non-Pro superfast deals are no-frills basic broadband - that's great for some but it won't appeal to everyone.

Edinburgh is lucky to have so many broadband providers competing for their attention in the ultrafast and gigabit categories.

Our top pick is Virgin Media because:

• They have excellent coverage compared to FTTP networks
• Their companion TV service is great
• They're the fastest overall

Of course, Virgin Media's coverage isn't universal, meaning many customers who might want to take them up on their high speeds won't be able to.

If Virgin services aren't an option, Vodafone's packages are some of the cheapest out there and Hyperoptic are great where they are available.

Interested in broadband with TV in Edinburgh? Compare deals now.