Ookla recently published a report that looks at statistics related to the digital divide. Ookla is in a unique position to understand U.S. broadband since the company is the most popular speed test company that gathers huge numbers of speed tests from all over the country.

Here are some of the key findings of the report:

• 32 states saw an increase in the digital divide between urban and rural households in the second half of 2024. Ookla measured this by looking at the median broadband speeds for urban versus rural parts of each state, and in these states, the gulf between urban and rural increased.
• Overall speeds are up, and 17 states saw an increase in the percentage of speed tests faster than 100/20 Mbps, with New Mexico, Colorado, and Minnesota having the most improvement.
• The number of states where at least 60% of users realized speeds of 100/20 Mbps or faster increased from 9 in the first half of 2024 to 22 in the second half of the year.
• The states with the highest percentage of users seeing fast speeds are New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware, North Dakota, and Maryland. 19 states and the District of Columbia had at least 60% of speed tests faster than 100/20 Mbps.
• Alaska and Montana had the worst broadband performance with less than 40% of users receiving speeds faster than 100/20 Mbps.
• South Carolina is the only state that saw improvements in broadband performance in both urban and rural parts of the state.

Some states showed dramatic improvements in the percentage of speed tests above 100/20 Mbps. New Mexico climbed from 31.85% in the second half of 2023 to 52.37% in the second half of 2024, an improvement of 20.5%. Other big increases were Colorado at 19.1%, Pennsylvania at 18.5%, Minnesota at 17.4%, and Washington at 17.2%.

Ookla cited reports from the Fiber Broadband Association that shows that 56.5% of homes were passed by fiber at the end of 2024, an increase of 10.3 million new fiber passings during the year. Ookla credits the overall increase in speeds and the percentage of users seeing speeds faster than 100/20 Mbps on these investments.

Ookla came to the overall conclusion that urban broadband is improving at a faster pace than rural broadband. I was surprised by this finding. While it’s true that BEAD grants have continued to move slowly, there was a huge amount of broadband upgrades in rural markets last year. Many billions of dollars were invested in fiber from grant programs like the Capital Project Funds, Reconnect, and RDOF. A lot of rural communities have also started to see the much faster radios from WISPs and cellular carriers. But even with those improvements, speed improvements in urban areas are outpacing improvements in rural America.