Malaysian internet speeds have made substantial progress in 2016. According to Akamai’s quarterly State of the Internet report, the country has seen average internet speeds rise to 8.2Mbps and a jump in the number of high speed connections.
Akamai’s reports had shown that Malaysia had average internet speeds of 6.4Mbps at the beginning of 2016. This ranked the country at 74th place overall in the world. The end of 2016 had Malaysia jump eight places up to 66th. Despite this, Malaysia actually dropped by one place to 10th in the APAC region.
This was due to Vietnam experiencing a massive boost in terms of internet quality. The country shot from 5Mbps to 8.3Mbps in just 12 months. Akamai also notes that Vietnam’s Q4 data shows a growth of 115 percent year-on-year.
Malaysia’s own internet growth appears to largely come from highspeed internet; particularly from connections of 10Mbps or more. The percentage of connections made from below 4Mbps was relatively stagnant at 69 percent – barely a 1 percent increase over the first quarter.
However, this stands in stark contrast with the percentage of connections above 10Mbps; which made up for 27 percent all Malaysian connections. This was a substantial increase from just 11 percent in Q1 2016. Akamai notes that this also represents a 397 percent increase year-on-year.
This report doesn’t paint a full picture of internet connections in the world. The connections recorded were still on the older IPv4 standard, and Akamai was unable to collect any meaningful IPv6 data. It also doesn’t quite show mobile connections or broadband penetration within the individual countries.
That said, it shows that while Malaysians often complain about their internet speeds, things are getting better. That’s all we can really hope for at this point.
