If you’re looking for the state that has the best broadband speeds, look no further than Rhode Island. The New England state, according to data compiled by Cable.co.uk, has an average speed of 36.7 Mbps.
The rankings, based on new data extracted and compiled by Cable.co.uk from over 42 million U.S. speed tests, reveal the difference in the average broadband speed across the United States.
These 42 million speed tests were collected across the 12 months up to May 10 this year by M-Lab, a partnership between New America's Open Technology Institute, Google Open Source Research, Princeton University's PlanetLab, other supporting partners, and compiled and extracted by consumer broadband analysts at Cable.co.uk.
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According to the analysis, the majority of the top 10 states are located on the East Coast, apart from Oregon and Washington. Further, Western states California and Nevada also have high average download speeds.
| Ranking | State code | State | Mean download speed | Number of distinct IPs | Total number of tests | Time to download a large HD movie (7.5GB) HH:MM:SS |
| 1 | RI | Rhode Island | 36.69 | 20584 | 94926 | 00:27:54 |
| 2 | WA | Washington | 34.25 | 282291 | 1387561 | 00:29:54 |
| 3 | MA | Massachusetts | 34.06 | 165865 | 870177 | 00:30:04 |
| 4 | MD | Maryland | 33.23 | 107717 | 552141 | 00:30:49 |
| 5 | VA | Virginia | 32.72 | 206238 | 955755 | 00:31:18 |
| 6 | NJ | New Jersey | 32.57 | 196650 | 6491602 | 00:31:27 |
| 7 | OR | Oregon | 32.16 | 154083 | 612642 | 00:31:51 |
| 8 | NY | New York | 30.22 | 455707 | 2166140 | 00:33:53 |
| 9 | DC | Washington, D.C. | 30.07 | 23904 | 171566 | 00:34:03 |
| 10 | DE | Delaware | 29.78 | 17767 | 77834 | 00:34:23 |
| 11 | CT | Connecticut | 27.73 | 85630 | 469736 | 00:36:55 |
| 12 | NV | Nevada | 26.04 | 75532 | 326434 | 00:39:19 |
| 13 | CA | California | 26.00 | 1192996 | 6271684 | 00:39:23 |
| 14 | TX | Texas | 24.82 | 602462 | 3079792 | 00:41:15 |
| 15 | PA | Pennsylvania | 24.56 | 250544 | 1086481 | 00:41:41 |
| 16 | FL | Florida | 24.34 | 464310 | 2117592 | 00:42:04 |
| 17 | KS | Kansas | 23.95 | 65906 | 271902 | 00:42:45 |
| 18 | NH | New Hampshire | 23.55 | 37452 | 155100 | 00:43:29 |
| 19 | MN | Minnesota | 22.48 | 176106 | 727401 | 00:45:33 |
| 20 | OK | Oklahoma | 22.14 | 84513 | 383418 | 00:46:15 |
| 21 | MO | Missouri | 21.55 | 139103 | 578715 | 00:47:32 |
| 22 | AZ | Arizona | 21.18 | 230068 | 912714 | 00:48:20 |
| 23 | NC | North Carolina | 21.15 | 248103 | 1045951 | 00:48:25 |
| 24 | IL | Illinois | 20.47 | 304895 | 1575553 | 00:50:02 |
| 25 | CO | Colorado | 20.01 | 205058 | 859590 | 00:51:10 |
| 26 | LA | Louisiana | 19.20 | 78270 | 347591 | 00:53:20 |
| 27 | GA | Georgia | 19.12 | 231384 | 1189625 | 00:53:34 |
| 28 | TN | Tennessee | 18.92 | 136472 | 609283 | 00:54:08 |
| 29 | ND | North Dakota | 18.89 | 17766 | 70023 | 00:54:13 |
| 30 | IN | Indiana | 18.61 | 142057 | 612558 | 00:55:01 |
| 31 | UT | Utah | 18.29 | 119475 | 446286 | 00:56:00 |
| 32 | VT | Vermont | 17.82 | 22387 | 88555 | 00:57:28 |
| 33 | MI | Michigan | 17.58 | 234002 | 1019035 | 00:58:16 |
| 34 | AL | Alabama | 17.49 | 83017 | 364955 | 00:58:32 |
| 35 | SD | South Dakota | 17.38 | 15961 | 64901 | 00:58:55 |
| 36 | SC | South Carolina | 17.34 | 89056 | 370823 | 00:59:04 |
| 37 | WI | Wisconsin | 17.23 | 131234 | 527836 | 00:59:27 |
| 38 | IA | Iowa | 17.05 | 96049 | 389940 | 01:00:04 |
| 39 | AR | Arkansas | 16.45 | 58826 | 255822 | 01:02:14 |
| 40 | NE | Nebraska | 15.92 | 56789 | 206696 | 01:04:19 |
| 41 | NM | New Mexico | 15.34 | 55996 | 214109 | 01:06:45 |
| 42 | WV | West Virginia | 15.11 | 32789 | 118093 | 01:07:45 |
| 43 | OH | Ohio | 13.83 | 245856 | 1058934 | 01:14:01 |
| 44 | HI | Hawaii | 13.69 | 26739 | 111690 | 01:14:46 |
| 45 | KY | Kentucky | 13.15 | 90043 | 338379 | 01:17:52 |
| 46 | MS | Mississippi | 12.99 | 36730 | 158297 | 01:18:50 |
| 47 | ID | Idaho | 12.71 | 49522 | 178327 | 01:20:34 |
| 48 | AK | Alaska | 11.99 | 20614 | 67115 | 01:25:22 |
| 49 | WY | Wyoming | 11.89 | 13866 | 55885 | 01:26:08 |
| 50 | ME | Maine | 11.73 | 29940 | 109770 | 01:27:20 |
| 51 | MT | Montana | 10.94 | 25326 | 97954 | 01:33:36 |
| Source: M-Lab |
Researchers noted that there were marked contrasts between cities across America, even those in the same states.
The study also measured the states and places with the lowest broadband speeds. From a state basis, Montana came in last with an average speed of 10.94 Mbps. Meanwhile, the slowest city for download speeds was Southerly North Slope Bo, Alaska, with a download speed of 0.28 Mbps.
What the disparities in speed show is that downloading an HD movie in Rhode Island would take 27 minutes and 54 seconds, but in Montana it would take 1 hour and 33 minutes, which is more than three times as long.
"Urban areas, particularly on the coasts, have exceptional access compared to the Midwest and rural areas, reflecting social, geographic, and economic divides," said Collin Anderson, independent researcher at M-Lab, in a release.
Anderson added that by using "Cable.co.uk's continued investigation, we can start to paint an important picture about how the internet differs for people across locations and over time."