The use of the Internet in Iceland places Iceland among the top countries in the world in terms of Internet deployment and use. 99.68% of Icelanders used in the internet in 2021.
As of October 2023, Iceland is listed 10th in the world for fixed access download speeds according to speedtest.net at 187.57 Mbit/s. Today, 90% citizens are connected to full-fibre (FTTH) networks, with at least 1 Gbit/s speeds available to all and 10 Gbit/s available to most. Iceland has 168.2 Tbit/s of submarine bandwidth capacity through 4 cables. 97% of Icelanders used an electronic ID in 2022 to identify themselves online.
Míla (formerly part of Síminn, former incumbent) operates the largest national trunk network, copper and GPON (FTTH) fibre access network. Ljósleiðarinn, originally a fully municipal owned network, operates a competing national trunk and bitsteam access PTP fibre network. Smaller local ISPs operate locally. Neyðarlínan (112), is the current government-owned universal service provider. Síminn, Vodafone, NOVA and Hringdu are the Iargest ISPs in Iceland.
ISNIC is the Icelandic domain registry for its country-code top level domain, .is. It is a member of the RIPE NCC, Europe's regional Internet registry. ISNIC also operate Iceland's only open-policy internet exchange point, the Reykjavík Internet Exchange (RIX). CERT-IS manages Iceland's national cyber-security.
Access technology
Full-fibre is the most common connection medium (FTTH/FTTB, through both PTP and GPON). Some rural towns are still reliant on VDSL connections. A minority of rural connections are by provided by ADSL and fixed wireless in the most remote of locations.
As of the end of 2022: 82% of broadband connections using optical fibre (FTTH). 16.2% of the broadband access being VDSL (FTTC). 1.5% of broadband access by ADSL 0.2% of access is provided by fixed wireless.
In terms of advertised download speeds: 68.4% of connections are 500 Mbit/s and above 17.2% of connections are between 100 and 500 Mbit/s and above. 14.3% of connections are between 10 and 100 Mbit/s. Less than 0.1% of connections are below 10 Mbit/s.
Over 90% of homes in Iceland have full fibre access, However the uptake of fibre services is only 82%. Míla offers a XG-PON/GPON network with a minimum flat rate delivered at 1 Gbit/s, and additional access tiers of 2.5, 5 and 10 Gbit/s. Ljósleiðarinn's network is based on a PTP wholesale interconnect model, with a minimum flat rate delivered at 1 Gbit/s and an additional charge for 10 Gbit/s service. Ljósleiðarinn's full fibre network extends to 100% of the Reykjavík capital area as of 2016. Míla operates full-fibre access networks in most urban areas of Iceland but does not have as complete coverage of the Reykjavík area. Ljósleiðarinn also has 100% fibre coverage in smaller towns such as Reykjanesbær, Akranes, Þorlákshöfn, Hella, Selfoss and Hvolsvöllur.
There are other smaller fibre networks run by local municipalities and companies, a major one being Tengir in the north east of Iceland providing a fibre network to Akureyri and surrounding regions offering up to >1Gbit/s speeds.
Rural Access
The government has engaged in a programme called Ísland Ljóstengt running from 2016 to 2022. It funds FTTH deployment to 5,500 rural locations allowing this goal to be reached. As of 2022, around 2,000 locations remain that only have ADSL service (lower than 10Mb/s speed), accounting for 1.5% of connections. The Government of Iceland's goal is for 99% of homes and businesses to have access to at least 100Mbit/s speeds by the year 2022.
As of 2022 there are also 64,000 active data-only 4G/5G subscribtions, mainly used for second homes and Mi-Fi devices, as well as serving as an alternative to fixed-line DSL/fibre services.
Internet Service Providers
Internet service in Iceland is divided between the international providers, national ISP and access network providers.
International Providers
The only international providers are Farice ehf. and Tusass A/S (as per the subsea connections listed in the section below).
National ISPs
National ISPs contract the internation bandwidth and manage services for the customer.
Others ISPs constitute 2.4% of the market (Hrigiðan, Snerpa, Origo etc.).
Access Operators
The following operators offer access networks. Míla operates a national fibre and copper access network (incumbent). The others operate full fibre networks. Ljósleiðarinn is the second largest network, covering most towns in the southwest of the country. Other networks cover regional areas and municipal networks.