Fiber Internet vs. Cable Internet: What’s the Difference?

Fast and reliable internet service is important to all types of organizations. But which kind of internet service is best for your business? In this article, we’ll examine fiber vs. coaxial internet service to help you learn more about available options.

Cable Internet

What is Cable Internet?

Cable internet service (or cable broadband)is delivered using the same kind of coaxial cables used to carry cable television signals. When you compare coax vs. fiber, cable internet gives you asymmetric speeds, meaning that the upload speeds are lower than the download speeds.

Many of today’s companies use cable connections for their business broadband service. Cable Internet’s biggest drawback is speed fluctuation. Looking again to fiber internet vs. cable internet, cable internet service is usually shared among a number of subscribers. This means if there are a large number of users in a cable region all running bandwidth intensive applications using the internet at the same time, everyone’s speeds can vary between 100% and 25% of the promised speed.

Benefits of Cable Internet

Cable internet is widely available, so you generally won’t have any trouble getting your business connected. Most business internet providers offer more than one speed and pricing options, so this is an affordable option for nearly every company.

Cable ONE Business Internet Plans start at just $50 per month when bundled with one or more Business Phone lines on a three-year commitment. Visit the Business Internet page to learn more about the plans and speeds that may be available.

Fiber Optic Internet

As described above, the difference between cable vs. fiber optic internet service is the type of cables used to deliver the service..

What is Fiber Internet?

Fiber optic cables are clusters of transparent glass fibers, each about the same diameter as a human hair. Fiber optic cables convert electrical signals carrying data to light—and since light travels very fast, it results in speedy internet service. When you compare coax vs. fiber optic internet speeds, fiber speeds are much faster.

What is the Cost of Fiber Internet?

As far as the cost of fiber vs. coaxial, fiber is typically much higher upfront, particularly if you require fiber installation or a new connection be installed at your business. After installation, the pricing for dedicated internet access over fiber will also be higher than a shared cable internet connection. Like cable internet service, business internet providers who offer fiber internet service usually have multiple plans to choose from with varied pricing and speeds.

Benefits of Fiber Internet

The biggest benefits to fiber internet vs. cable internet are scalability and symmetric speeds. You can future-proof your business internet service by choosing a fiber connection; no matter what speed you choose today; you can easily upgrade to faster speeds with just a phone call. But today’s biggest drawback to a fiber optic internet connection is availability. While fiber is available in nearly every community, the distance from your place of business to a provider’s fiber-optic lines is typically further than accessibility to the coax lines which may result in some construction efforts to bring fiber to your building.  

Contact a local Cable ONE Business account executive to learn more about Dedicated Internet Access over fiber by calling 855-60-FIBER.

Choosing Between Fiber vs Cable Internet

There are useful online tools to help you measure your current needs as you choose between fiber and cable internet service:

• Test your existing DSL, cable or fiber internet connection by using our fiber optic broadband checker tool.
• Determine your current network usage to find out if you need to increase bandwidth analyzing your usage, number of users, and types of internet-based activity. This is especially important if you regularly transfer large files, powering a voice-over-IP phone system, video conferencing, powering servers, or streaming video.

Why Cable ONE Business?

At Cable ONE Business, we want to be not only your business internet provider, but a partner that serves your business and continues to meet your needs as you grow. We offer scalable and customizable cable and dedicated fiber optic business broadband plans to give you the internet speeds you need at a price that’s right for your company—both today and in the future.

Our super-reliable, fiber-rich network provides alternatives to the phone company or other national providers and our 24/7 business-grade support services are always there to help keep you up and running.