Virgin Media M250 Fibre Broadband

Virgin Media's M250 broadband plan offers average download speeds of 264Mbps - fast enough for households of three or four people with multiple devices online at once.

It's available to around 60% of UK homes across both Virgin Media's existing cable network and upgraded full fibre and Nexfibre areas.

M250 with an O2 SIM offers the best value, with Volt benefits and the whole-home WiFi Max guarantee with mesh boosters included.

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Quick verdict

M250 is competitively priced for 264Mbps speeds, and the WiFi 6-enabled Hub 5 as standard puts it ahead of some rivals still supplying older hardware. Upload runs at 25Mbps, though customers on Virgin's full fibre network can upgrade to symmetrical speeds for £6 a month. A minimum guaranteed speed of 132Mbps applies across all options.

Existing O2 customers automatically qualify for Volt, which includes double data on all household O2 mobile plans and the WiFi Max whole-home guarantee - up to three WiFi boosters, normally worth £8/month. For everyone else, the M250 + O2 SIM bundle is the way to unlock those same benefits.

However, make sure to factor in Virgin Media's annual price rise of £4/month each April from 2027 - the headline price today is likely to go up twice within the 24-month contract.

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At a glance

Virgin Media M250 broadband plans

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What does Virgin Media M250 include?

Every M250 plan includes the WiFi 6-enabled Hub 5 router and free setup and installation as standard. Beyond that, what you get depends on the bundle you choose.

The core broadband-only plan is the simplest option, but M250 can be bundled with a home phone line, an O2 SIM, and Virgin TV through the Flex add-on. Each can be added individually or as part of a combined package.

Taking M250 with an O2 SIM unlocks Volt - Virgin Media's benefit scheme for customers who also have an O2 mobile plan. Volt includes the WiFi Max whole-home guarantee, which promises a minimum 30Mbps in every room backed by up to three Plume mesh boosters, plus double mobile data on all O2 SIM plans in the household, a free roaming bolt-on, and access to O2 Priority rewards. WiFi Max is normally £8/month as a standalone add-on, so it represents a meaningful inclusion.

Flex is Virgin Media's streaming TV service, it comes with the Stream box and over 150 Freeview and FAST (Free Ad-Supported TV) channels. It supports a variety of on-demand apps including Netflix, Disney+ and HBO Max, and can be customised with Sky channel packs on a rolling monthly basis.

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Is M250 fibre broadband the right choice for me?

M250 delivers average download speeds of 264Mbps - close to the UK national average of 285Mbps, and enough capacity for households where several people are streaming, gaming, or working from home at the same time.

Virgin Media describes M250 as ideal for households with two to four people and ten or more connected devices. At 264Mbps, a 1080p HD film downloads in around three minutes, and a 100GB game like Black Myth: Wukong in just over 90 minutes.

M250 fibre broadband is best suited to:

• Households of two to four people where multiple people are online at the same time
• Home workers who need a reliable, fast connection for video calls and large file transfers
• Gamers and streamers running HD or 4K content across more than one screen
• Smart home users running multiple connected devices

It's also a good upgrade over M125, at just £2 more per month for double the download speed.

For existing O2 customers, or anyone with good O2 coverage who's open to a SIM - bundling brings the WiFi Max whole-home guarantee at no extra cost (normally £8/month) and a 4GB SIM that would cost around £18/month standalone.

Households that think they may need more headroom should also consider M500, which is currently the next step up in price at £27.99/month and delivers roughly double the download speed.

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How much does Virgin Media M250 cost?

Virgin Media M250 starts from £25.99 per month on a 24-month contract, with free setup.

Those in one of Virgin's 8.3 million upgraded or Nexfibre-built full fibre homes can add symmetrical uploads of 264Mbps for £6 per month - a worthwhile upgrade for anyone who regularly sends large files or works with cloud storage.

The table below shows current pricing for broadband-only, broadband and phone (with anytime UK calls), and the O2 SIM bundle with Volt benefits:

The broadband-only plan is the cheapest entry point. For £8 more per month, you can add a home phone line with anytime calls to UK landlines and mobiles included - a straightforward add-on if you need it.

The O2 SIM bundle is the standout option for most households. It adds a 4GB SIM with unlimited minutes and texts, and brings in the full set of Volt benefits - including the WiFi Max whole-home guarantee, normally £8/month on its own. Volt also includes double mobile data on all O2 SIM plans in the household, a free roaming bolt-on, and access to O2 Priority rewards.

M250 can also be taken with Virgin Flex TV for £5 per month - a 30-day add-on providing access to over 150 live free-to-air channels and optional packs including Sky Entertainment with Sky Atlantic, Sky Sports, Sky Cinema and TNT Sports. We cover this in more detail in the next section.

Setup, installation and activation are all free.

Prices rise annually from April 2027 - by £4 per month on broadband-only plans, and an additional £2.50 per month for those on the O2 SIM bundle.

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M250 + Virgin Media Flex TV

Flex is Virgin Media's contract-free TV service, delivered through the Stream box over the broadband connection. One of its biggest selling points is that customers don't need a TV aerial - live Freeview channels are streamed directly over the broadband line instead.

The base service costs £5 a month and covers 150+ channels including Freeview, catch-up apps, and a library of FAST channels integrated into the main TV guide. Premium subscriptions including Sky Cinema, Sky Sports, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and HBO Max can all be added on monthly rolling terms, with no long-term commitment required.

The table below shows current M250 pricing with Flex included:

The 10% bill credit on premium subscriptions paid through Virgin is a useful perk, but costs climb quickly once you move beyond the free channels.

The Essential Entertainment pack adds Sky's entertainment channels for £15 a month, bringing M250 with Flex to around £45.99 before Netflix. At that point, Virgin's Entertainment bundle - which includes those same channels, Netflix, and M350 broadband - at £34.99 a month is worth comparing directly.

Flex works well for households who want the option to dip in and out of premium TV without a long-term commitment. For those who know they want a full TV package, a Mega TV bundle is likely to offer better value overall.

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M250 vs M500 broadband

Virgin Media's broadband range runs from M125 up to Gig2 in select areas. M250 sits at the entry-level end of that range, with M350, M500, Gig1, and Gig2 above it.

The table below compares M250 and M500 on speed:

M500 currently costs less per month than M350, which makes it the more logical upgrade from M250 right now. That means stepping from 264Mbps to 516Mbps for less than the cost of going to 362Mbps - M350 is effectively the odd one out at current pricing.

Virgin Media's tier pricing isn't always consistent and can shift over time, so it's worth checking the latest prices before committing. If M350 comes back down in price, it may become the more sensible middle step again.

Current pricing for M250, M500, and M350 is shown below:

Should you upgrade to M500?

M250 is sufficient for most households of two to four people - it comfortably handles simultaneous streaming, gaming, video calls, and general browsing. The national average download speed is around 285Mbps, so M250 is already close to what most UK households currently receive.

M500 becomes worthwhile where demand is consistently high - larger households with five or more people, or homes where several people are running bandwidth-heavy activities like 4K streaming and online gaming at the same time.

Overall, M250 is the right call for most households. If multiple people are regularly competing for bandwidth at the same time, M500 currently offers the best value upgrade - more than doubling the download speed for less than the cost of M350.

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How does M250 compare to other providers?

Most rival providers at a similar price point offer full fibre 300 plans - so M250's 264Mbps sits slightly below on paper, but often at a lower or equivalent monthly cost. The more meaningful differences are in what each plan bundles in alongside the broadband.

The table below shows M250 alongside the closest competing plans from other providers:

At £25.99/month, M250 matches Plusnet's 300Mb full fibre plan on price, while offering a slightly slower headline speed. BT and NOW both charge more for equivalent full fibre 300 speeds - £30.99 and £30 respectively.

Sky is worth a direct mention here. Sky Full Fibre 500 - nearly double the download speed of M250 - is currently £27/month as a broadband-only deal, and drops to £25/month when taken with a Sky TV package. That makes Sky a compelling alternative for households already considering a TV subscription, delivering significantly faster speeds for a similar or lower monthly outlay than M250.

Where Virgin Media holds its ground is on bundling flexibility and router hardware. The O2 SIM bundle unlocks Volt - bringing WiFi Max, double mobile data, and O2 Priority into the package - and Flex TV can be added on a rolling monthly basis without a long-term TV commitment.

Plusnet, BT, and NOW all supply WiFi 5 routers as standard - only NOW offers a WiFi 6 upgrade at £6/month extra - while both Virgin and Sky include WiFi 6 routers as standard.

Compare providers side-by-side in our comparison tool.

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How fast is Virgin M250 broadband?

Virgin Media advertises average speeds based on what at least 50% of customers actually receive during the busiest period of the day - 8pm to 10pm.

Virgin Media's own figures put the expected download speed range at 269-274Mbps and upload at around 26Mbps - slightly above the advertised averages, which is consistent with most customers receiving at or above the stated speed.

To put 264Mbps into context, it's fast enough to download a full HD film in around three minutes, or a 50GB game in just over half an hour. A typical household running several 4K streams, a couple of video calls and a few devices browsing in the background simultaneously would be well within its limits.

In practice, M250 comfortably supports:

• 4K streaming on four or five screens at once (Netflix 4K requires around 25Mbps per stream)
• Multiple people working from home on video calls without affecting each other
• Online gaming with no speed-related lag - though latency matters more than raw speed for gaming
• Large file downloads running in the background without slowing other devices down

Where it starts to feel limited is on the upload side. At 25Mbps, most households won't notice - but if two people are on video calls while someone else is uploading files to the cloud, you may start to feel the constraint.

Virgin Media now supplies M250 with the Hub 5, a WiFi 6 router. For customers with WiFi 6-capable devices, this helps ensure the speeds reaching your router translate into the wireless performance you actually experience - something that held back earlier customers on the older Hub 3 or Hub 4.

Minimum guaranteed speed

Virgin Media is signed up to Ofcom's Code of Practice on Broadband Speeds, which requires providers to give customers a minimum guaranteed speed at sign-up. If that minimum isn't met for three consecutive days or more and Virgin can't resolve the issue within 30 days, customers can leave their contract without penalty.

The minimum of 132Mbps is roughly half the advertised speed. It's a hard floor rather than a typical figure - drop below it and you have grounds to exit the contract.

Upload speeds

At 25Mbps, upload is adequate for video calls, online gaming and routine cloud backups. For anyone regularly sending large files or working with high-resolution video it can become a bottleneck.

Customers in one of Virgin's upgraded or Nexfibre-built full fibre homes can add symmetrical uploads of 264Mbps for £6 per month - a meaningful step up for upload-heavy households.

For upload-heavy use, it's worth checking whether a full fibre provider with symmetrical speeds - such as those building on CityFibre or Community Fibre's network - is available in your area.

Reliability

Virgin Media's network uses HFC technology - fibre runs to a street cabinet, with coaxial cable completing the final connection into the home. Full fibre providers using the Openreach network run fibre all the way to the premises, which generally delivers lower latency and more consistent performance under load.

Virgin is in the process of upgrading its existing cable network to full fibre (Project Mustang), with street-level work targeting completion by 2028. Around 8.3 million of its 18.8 million premises - roughly 44% - are already on full fibre, so whether the HFC limitation applies to you depends on where you live.

For a detailed look at how Virgin compares on reliability, see our most reliable broadband guide.

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Virgin broadband router

Virgin Media now supplies M250 with the Hub 5 as standard, or the Hub 5x for customers in upgraded full fibre areas. Both are WiFi 6 routers - a step up on the older Hub 4 and Hub 3, which were both WiFi 5 devices.

The Hub 5 and 5x both bring meaningful improvements over their predecessors. WiFi 6 handles multiple simultaneous connections more efficiently than WiFi 5, which matters in homes with lots of devices competing for bandwidth. WPA3 security is also a step up from the WPA2 found on the Hub 3 and Hub 4. The 5x adds a 10Gbps ethernet port in place of the 2.5Gbps port on the Hub 5 - overkill for M250, but relevant for customers who upgrade to a faster plan later.

The jump from Hub 3 to Hub 5 is the most significant - the Hub 3's 2x2 antenna configuration and DOCSIS 3.0 connection were increasingly a bottleneck on faster plans. The Hub 4 closed much of that gap, but WiFi 5 still struggles in denser device environments compared to WiFi 6's improved handling of multiple simultaneous connections.

WiFi guarantee

Both the Hub 5 and Hub 5x are compatible with Virgin Media's WiFi Max guarantee, which promises minimum download speeds of 30Mbps in every room - or a £100 bill credit if that standard isn't met. It includes provision of up to three mesh WiFi Pods that plug into standard electrical sockets to extend coverage around the home.

WiFi Max is included free for Volt customers, or available as an add-on for £8 per month on a 30-day rolling contract - straightforward to cancel if it's not needed.

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Verdict: Is Virgin M250 broadband any good?

M250 is a capable mid-range package that suits most households comfortably. At 264Mbps, it's fast enough for 4K streaming across multiple screens, simultaneous video calls and heavy background usage without things grinding to a halt - and the Hub 5 means that speed is more likely to reach devices wirelessly than it would have been on older hardware.

The broadband-only plan is one of Virgin's more affordable entry points, and the gap to M500 is worth checking at the time of signing up - if the price difference is small, the headroom is worth having for larger households.

Where M250 makes most sense is with the Volt bundle. The WiFi Max guarantee alone is normally £8 per month, so Volt customers are effectively getting whole-home coverage assurance built into the price, alongside the O2 SIM benefits. For households that would otherwise pay separately for those extras, the bundle represents straightforward value.

The main limitation is upload speed. At 25Mbps it's adequate for most, but households with genuinely heavy upload demands - video production, large cloud backups, multiple simultaneous video calls - may find it constraining. Customers in upgraded full fibre areas can address this with the symmetrical speed add-on for £6 per month, which brings uploads up to 264Mbps.

For those open to TV, Virgin Flex adds over 150 live channels on a 30-day contract from £5 per month - low commitment for households that want to try it without locking in.

Virgin M250 is a solid choice for medium to large households that want reliable speed at a reasonable price. The Volt bundle is the version most people should be looking at.

Ready to take the next step? You can compare Virgin Media broadband deals, check availability at your address, or read our full Virgin Media broadband review for a broader look at the provider.