Internet Providers in Your Area

To see which internet service providers (ISPs) are available in your area, enter your zip code below.

 

Internet providers by zip code

Internet providers by city

If you are overwhelmed or unsure of who to call after entering your zip code, read on.

 

Which type of internet service is best?

This depends on lots of factors, such as your download vs. upload requirements, budget, and which individual providers are available. For most people, however, we recommend choosing in the following order:

  1. Municipal fiber if available. These are fiber services run by or in cooperation with the city itself. These city and county fiber providers generally charge less and move prices around less. Some cities may have problems with reliability as they lack the expertise to run an internet service provider, but this is not a common problem.
  2. Larger fiber providers from telecommunications companies. The highest rated fiber services include AT&T, Verizon, Centurylink, Frontier, and Windstream. Many of these providers have a bad reputation due to their slower DSL service, but people are generally happy with their fiber optic offerings.
  3. Cable companies such as XFINITY, Charter Spectrum, and Cox Communications. These companies have increased their download speeds dramatically in recent years, but are still known for poor customer service, peak time slowdowns, price increases, and slower upload speeds. Still, the speeds are fine for most homes, and most people are happy with their cable internet service.
  4. DSL or fixed wireless providers may be better for you depending on your needs. DSL speeds vary dramatically, swinging from as low as 0.3 Mbps (which is basically unusable by today's standards) to as high as 80 Mbps in the same neighborhood. Fixed wireless tends to offer higher speeds, but at the cost of reliability. Heavy weather and obstructions in the line of sight may cause issues. People living closer to towers report fewer problems, but it's hard to know what your experience will be like until you try. In general, this is what we'd recommend:
    • If you can get speeds over 10 Mbps and don't have a lot of internet-connected devices, DSL is probably a better option. Just make sure to scroll down and check on the “more information” section to learn about upload speeds. You will want upload speeds above 2-3 Mbps if you want to do video calls or use voice chat while gaming.
    • If you need more bandwidth (for streaming, lots of household members, or lots of internet connected devices), go with fixed wireless service, especially if you live in an area with little precipitation or where you can see great distances from your roof. If you're at a cabin encircled by trees, this is probably not even an option.
    • If you want to play online games, but also have a lot of devices, you may want to get both. Expensive, yes, but you can keep computers and consoles running on the DSL line while running security cameras and other streaming devices over fixed wireless.
  5. Cellular internet is also an option. Providers like AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint even rent cellular modems. The latency is actually manageable, allowing you to play games, and speeds are adequate. This type of service can be expensive, though, and if bundled with your phone plan you'll find it's not hard to reach your bandwidth cap, at which point your provider will slow you down or charge per gigabit. Being capped at a slow speed will be frustratingly slow, and being charged per gigabit becomes absurdly expensive very quickly. Some providers offer unlimited data packages to rural customers with no caps, but these plans are also far more expensive than the service choices above.
  6. Satellite internet allows you to stay connected, but the latency will limit what you can do. For example, you'll be downloading Netflix shows in advance rather than streaming them in the moment. Online gaming will probably not be an option on any satellite internet service.

You can always click over to each provider to see what each plan might cost. Make sure to watch for plans that say things like “for the first 6 months” in small text, and make sure you know what the plan will cost after the promotional period.

Comparing broadband technologies: Fiber vs Cable vs DSL

Broadband type
Download speed range
Upload speed range
Fiber
50 to 1,000 Mbps
50 to 1,000 Mbps
Cable
10 to 1,000 Mbps
5 to 50 Mbps
DSL
5 to 35 Mbps
1 to 10 Mbps

Speed is undoubtedly the biggest differentiator for the vast majority of users. When most internet providers talk about speed, however, they are actually talking about bandwidth. In reality, broadband speed must be broken into two distinct characteristics: bandwidth and latency. So fiber internet is usually your best bet but it may not be available in all areas. Read on, enter your zip code above or click on a link below to find out which broadband internet technologies are available in your area.

What internet providers are available to my home address?

It depends where you live. When you enter your zip code you'll see every internet provider available in your area, from large to small. These internet service providers (ISPs) are some of the largest in the nation:

  • AT&T serves California, Nevada, and a large triangle of the country from Michigan to Texas and over to Florida with fiber and mixed fiber offerings.
  • XFINITY is the largest cable provider, covering both US coasts, the inter-mountain west, and most states east of the Mississippi.
  • Charter Spectrum cable has grown to cover the great lakes region, parts of the south, the northeast, parts of the northwest, and parts of the inter-mountain west.
  • Verizon's internet service is mostly confined to the northeast, and is the primary fiber provider for densely-packed areas like New York City.
  • Frontier Communications competes with cable companies in the west, small portions of the south, and all across the Great Lakes area to the Northeast.
  • Cox Communications provides cable service to Kansas, Oklahoma, and select cities throughout the US including Boise, Phoenix, New Orleans, San Diego, and more.
  • Centurylink provides DSL and fiber to large swaths of the country, trading off cities with Windstream, Frontier, Verizon, and AT&T sometimes with no visible pattern.
  • Windstream is available in almost every state. In many states, however, they serve more rural areas with DSL, with fiber only available in larger cities.

Most Americans can choose from two of the providers above. This will usually be between a traditional telecommunication company and a cable company. The quality of service varies dramatically by region and block, with the best service likely in highly-populated areas, especially in new developments. Keep in mind you can also get satellite TV from someone like DISH or DIRECTV. If you enter your zip code, you'll also see a map of competition by area.

 

How do I know what kind of broadband service is available?

The easiest way is to enter your zip code above. Because internet and TV service varies from block to block and sometimes even from home to home, we show which providers are available with a percent. You will see each provider, like the example internet service below:

Verizon | Fiber

Availability:

64.46%

Avg. Speed:

940 Mbps

Here's how to interpret what you're seeing:

  • After the pipe | you see the type of service. You may see multiple entries for the same internet provider on the same page. For example, Verizon may offer both fiber internet and DSL internet in the same city.
  • Availability is the percent of residents (in this case for New York City) who can get this company's fiber. If you're in the unlucky 37%, you will not be able to get service. The best way to know for sure is to call.
  • Average speed is actually the average maximum plan offered by the internet provider. For example, if half of the ISP's customers are offered 500 Mbps and the other half can only get 250 Mbps at most, we would show the average speed as 375 Mbps.
  • Links and phone numbers go to the providers' site or their authorized retailers. Some of these links may result in payment to us, which helps us keep the lights on. However, we do not let these payments influence the ordering of providers.

We also show provider availability and coverage maps, but trying to find your home on these maps is going to be more difficult than simply calling or clicking to see what's available.

In the United States, the following types of internet are available:

  • Fiber internet service is available to less than half of the country. Fiber to the home is even less common. Learn more about what that means here.
  • DSL is the next most available service, with service to 9/10 homes.
  • Cable is not far behind, and often competes with DSL service.
  • Fixed wireless is generally only available in rural areas. It would be hard for these providers to compete against fiber and cable providers, so they often don't try. For example, there are no registered fixed wireless providers in densely-populated Rhode Island.

Below are additional ways to see what service is available and where. Again, the easiest way is to put in your zip code above.

 

So what is the best internet service available at my address?

As we've been saying, all of the information about internet options in your area can be found at one of our location pages linked to below. We look at internet availability down to the block level so there you can explore maps to find out what internet is available to your address. If you're in a particularly rural area, with few potential broadband customers or infrastructure, you may be forced to use a slower type of internet technology such as DSL or satellite internet. Sometimes cost can be a major factor as well.

The fastest internet in your area is probably the cheapest option, if that's what you're looking for. That's why we've created these location-based guides to internet below. We hope to empower you, the customer, when making a decision about what mix speed, reliability and price makes sense for your situation. Click on a location below to find internet to your address.

 

Internet service and speeds by state

The map below shows which states have the fastest and slowest internet speeds available to them. Note these are not the places with the fastest average speeds, since customers can choose slower plans to save money. This map shows where you can get fast internet if you're willing to pay for it.


Click a state to see which providers cover more than 1% of the state and to find an internet company in your area.

Find broadband internet providers by state

If geography and state abbreviations just aren't your thing, here's a list of all 50 states (and Washington DC) and how to find the fastest internet available there:

 

Internet providers by city

If you're moving to a new city and not sure which zip code you'll be living in just yet, you can also browse the metro areas below.

Need more? The easiest way is to find a zip code in the area or choose the city above closest to your location. You will then be free to browse surrounding cities.

 

Internet providers by county

Some areas are better known for their county. It is usually more helpful to get more granular internet data, but if you're looking at a very broad area we compare internet service between counties as well.

 

Internet service by neighborhood

In some cases a zip code may even be too large. Service varies quite a bit in large cities among different neighborhoods. Compare your neighborhood to nearby neighborhoods for providers and internet speeds by clicking one of the larger neighborhoods below.

 

Internet service by zip

You can enter your zip code to see providers, or browse one of the larger zip codes below.