Thousands of Edinburgh homes and businesses can upgrade to new network

Eight Lothian locations dominate a list of the 20 places with the best ultrafast broadband coverage in Scotland, unveiled by Openreach today.

Across Edinburgh and the Lothians, 268,000 homes and businesses are among one million that can now access ultrafast broadband on Openreach’s Scottish network.

Tranent in East Lothian has the second highest coverage in the whole of Scotland, with more than nine out of 10 properties able to upgrade to ultrafast broadband.

The West Lothian village of Fauldhouse is third, with Whitburn, Corstorphine and South Queensferry close behind. Penicuik, Broxburn and West Calder all make the top 20.

Openreach has invested more than £80 million¹ in the new Lothian network so far, and is also working with the Scottish and UK Governments, through the Reaching 100% (R100) programme and voucher schemes, to upgrade some of its hardest-to-reach places.

People can visit openreach.co.uk/ultrafastfullfibre to register for updates and check their postcode to see if and when services are available from their chosen provider.

Robert Thorburn, Openreach Partnership Director for Scotland, said: “Our engineers and build partners have done an amazing job helping us bring the new full fibre network to one million homes and businesses across Scotland.

“Bringing fibre broadband to places like Kirkliston, Leith and  Livingston allows local people to enjoy all the benefits of ultrafast speeds now – and will meet their data demands decades into the future.

“The historic, internationally renowned city of Edinburgh wasn’t designed with fibre in mind, so we’ve had to be inventive and innovative in our approach.

“Around half the properties we’ve upgraded so far are tenements and flats, including social housing which supports some of the city’s most vulnerable residents.”

He added: “We’ve more to do, and we’re working closely with all the Lothians local authorities to overcome challenges and reach as many homes and businesses as possible.”

The Scottish Government’s Innovation Minister Richard Lochhead said: “This is an important milestone in the drive to ensure more homes and businesses across Scotland benefit from full fibre broadband, improving vital connectivity.

“We are working with Openreach to roll-out future-proofed digital infrastructure to our rural towns and villages and this Reaching 100% build, alongside Openreach’s commercial network, will underpin economic growth and enhance communities across Scotland for decades to come.”

UK Government Minister for Data and Digital Infrastructure Sir John Whittingdale said: “Thanks to UK government investment, thousands of rural homes, businesses and public buildings across Scotland now have access to first class broadband fit for the future.

“Over three quarters of premises across the UK can now access these faster speeds and with more collaboration with network builders like Openreach at a local and national level, we will see even more rural towns and villages staking their claim to this next-generation connectivity.”

The Openreach network offers the widest choice of providers, such as BT, Sky, TalkTalk, Vodafone and Zen, which means people have lots of choice and can shop for the best deals.

You can find out more about the benefits of an upgrade to Full Fibre broadband on the Openreach website.