Best Broadband for Rural Areas
Do you live in a rural location with poor broadband access? Is your business based miles away from your nearest telephone exchange?
Look no further than SimRush. It’s the best broadband for rural areas. Not only will it give you the best chance of getting a fantastic internet speed, but it also removes the need for copper phone lines to your premises.
What makes SimRush the best broadband for rural areas?
It’s wireless 4G broadband
No pre-existing infrastructure is required for SimRush to work. Instead of using copper or fibre cables, SimRush rural broadband uses 4G LTE signals to provide you with a broadband connection.
High Gain Antenna
Even if your mobile signal is weak, SimRush can pick up 4G LTE signals in areas where your mobile phone cannot. This makes it the perfect rural broadband solution for remote communities who don’t have excellent network coverage.
CAT 6 LTE modem
The SimRush Outdoor unit which is mounted on the outside of your business or home, has a built in CAT 6 modem. This enables carrier aggregation and allows the device to use multiple bands at the same time, meaning it provides higher efficiency for weaker signals in the countryside.
Bespoke configuration
Many rural homes and businesses are unique in their layout and build. SimRush can be configured to match the bespoke requirements of your business or home, no matter the size or complexity.
What are the benefits of having SimRush broadband in a rural area?
No landline phone service is needed.
You won’t have to pay a fee for monthly line rental if you don’t want to. Don’t use your landline? Time to ditch it!
Faster speeds compared to ADSL broadband and Satellite broadband.
SimRush 4G rural broadband offers an average speed of 25Mbps download for remote locations. The internet speeds you can achieve will depend on the strength of the mobile signal in your area. If you’ve got good 4G coverage you may see even higher than this! Read our full comparison of 4G broadband to other alternative methods here.
Flexible monthly data SIM contracts.
Choose the right data allowance and contract length for you. Unlimited data is readily available from all the major carrier networks. Whether you need a short term 30 day contract or a long term 24 month contract there are data options out there for you!
SimRush can move with you!
Unlike fixed wireless broadband, SimRush can be taken with you when your business moves premises, or you move house. Forget the hassle of sorting a new broadband service for your new location, just bring SimRush with you. Once you purchase the hardware it’s yours to use wherever you need it! This is just one of the advantages 4G broadband has over BT fixed broadband. Read our article for a full explanation on why you may choose 4G over fixed broadband.
Extend WiFi coverage around your whole premises
SimRush wireless access points can be used to extend WiFi to all the hard to reach areas of your rural home or office. You can get complete uninterrupted coverage for seamless connectivity!
Who needs rural connectivity?
SimRush can help provide broadband in rural areas for anyone that needs it, wherever they are. We can cater for:
- Construction sites
- Static homes
- Schools
- Office spaces/portacabins
- Events venues
- Hotels, pubs, restaurants
- Campsites
- Rural home broadband
- Farms
Case Study
Broadband for Rural Areas:
McLeod Aggregates Ltd – Dereham, Norfolk
McLeod Aggregates was established in January 2014 to take over the Tarmac processing site at Bittering, Norfolk. It works in conjunction with Raymond McLeod farms Ltd who farm some of the surrounding land and who supply unwashed gravel to Bittering.
Being a business based in Norfolk, McLeod Aggregates were well aware of the challenges that a rural location poses for connectivity.
The Problem
“With Head Office only 1 mile away it was very frustrating to have no card paying facilities and very slow, sometimes non-existent connectivity” – McLeod Aggregates Business owner
McLeod Aggregates wanted a connectivity option that would allow them to access superfast speeds for their remote site offices.
Fixed and wireless methods of delivery were not possible as they are located in an area that is not currently fibre enabled, and BT has no plans or timescales to implement fibre optic cables in their location.
The local wireless broadband provider was also unable to provide a service due to the office’s proximity to trees and lack of line of sight.
They needed a faster, reliable alternative that could be installed quickly to keep their business online. The solution needed to provide them with superfast speeds without having to wait months or years for fibre broadband infrastructure to be installed and without incurring excessive costs.
The Solution
SimRush approved reseller FreeClix stepped in with the solution to help solve the problem.
A SimRush demonstration was arranged at the site to show the business how the hardware works and why it was a good solution for them. Whilst on site, FreeClix performed a SimRush speed test using the SimRush One model to see what kind of speeds could be achieved in the rural location. The speed test found an average download speed of 25Mbps, which was a great improvement on the speeds from their current provider.
Working closely with McLeod Aggregates, FreeClix were also able to examine the business’ previous data usage figures and suggest a suitable data package that would meet the performance requirements of the business.
The Result
McLeod Aggregates are on average getting speeds of 25Mbps, which is a vast improvement on their previous broadband speed. McLeod Aggregates have access to high speed internet now, rather than having to wait months or even years for the fibre broadband roll out to come to their area.
SimRush does not rely on a fixed line so it meant McLeod Aggregates had SimRush installed and online in a matter of days rather than waiting weeks. As a result of their faster speeds, McLeod Aggregates will now be looking to install a card payment machine, in the near future to enable them to take payments online and make their business more efficient.
Their improved connection has also enabled communication with the head office to be much quicker and easier than ever before. SimRush proved itself to be the best broadband for rural areas.
Have questions? We've got answers:
There are many types of broadband available other than cable or fibre, or fixed wireless broadband.
A viable alternative to wired standard broadband is mobile broadband. Rather than using fibre optic cable to provide internet, mobile broadband uses the mobile phone network to provide connectivity.
Mobile broadband is more widely available compared to fibre broadband, as the majority of villages, towns and cities now have some degree of 4G coverage. It can provide superfast broadband speeds in areas with good coverage.
Satellite broadband is another alternative to fibre. This should only be considered as a last resort option as it has slower speeds and high latency which means it often has a poor user experience.
Both can be used as home broadband alternatives with 4G broadand promising better broadband speeds out of the two.
Fibre is not readily available to rural households for home broadband or businesses for business broadband.
There are several reasons for this. One being that houses tend to be further apart in the countryside & remote areas, so a single street cabinet can’t connect as many homes.
It’s also physically difficult to lay fibre cables in rural areas between the cabinet and your home. The rural landscape is not cable friendly, often containing lakes, hills and farms which all serve as obstacles to cable layers. The standard broadband infrastructure that’s already there tends to be old with out of date technology making it difficult to carry faster speeds.
In order to make fibre availability better in rural areas, more street cabinets are needed to reduce the line length to street properties. Fibre providers often have checkers so you can check what’s available in your area.
The 2025 ISDN switch off marks a move towards digital infrastructure. Along with the ISDN switch off, comes plans for a full fibre rollout across the country. However, this will happen in a phased approach with rural areas likely coming last on the list.
It could mean that fibre is rolled out to your area sooner than was originally planned, but it still could be a few years yet until fibre is available to you. In the meantime, it’s a good idea to plan the switch from your landline to a VoIP telephone system to prepare for the switch off.
SimRush does not require a phone line in order to work and it supports VoIP services. Switching to SimRush can help you prepare for the 2025 switch off.
Pros
- Potential for superfast speeds even in rural locations
- More flexible than wired standard broadband options
- Faster broadband than satellite internet
- You can pick a suitable mobile network and month contract for your data requirements
- Can move with you when you move as it is not reliant on a phone line
- Widely available in rural and urban areas
- Great for failover
- Self installation or professional installation options
Cons
- Upfront costs for hardware
- Fibre connections can often get faster speeds (especially in areas where there is not a long length to street cabinets)
- Not everyone has access to a good mobile signal
- Reliant on performance of the carrier networks (EE, O2 and Vodafone)
Pros
- Available everywhere across the UK even in rural locations
- Satellite dish installation is similar to a TV aerial
- Decent broadband connection sometimes possible
Cons
- Expensive option
- Restrictive data caps
- High latency (lags a lot)
- Slower than cable and fibre broadband
- Vulnerable to bad weather
- Won’t support a VPN
- Lags a lot
There are a few key things to consider when weigh the pros and cons of fibre broadband.
One important factor is your location. If you live in a rural area, you may not have access to fibre broadband at all – in fact, you may only have access to standard broadband (ADSL), which has much slower speeds.
Even if you live in an urban area, fibre broadband may not be available if your home is not close enough to the street cabinet. However, if you do have access to fibre broadband, there are some clear advantages.
Fibre broadband is much faster than ADSL broadband, so it’s ideal for households with multiple devices and people who use the internet for high-bandwidth activities like gaming or streaming movies. And because fibre broadband uses fibre optic cable instead of copper wire, it’s also less prone to interference from things like bad weather or electrical equipment.
Pros
- Fast download and upload speeds
- Suitable for large households and businesses
- Reliable connection
- Guaranteed download and upload speeds
- Wide range of packages available
Cons
- Fibre broadband can be expensive to install and maintain
- Not all areas have fibre broadband available
- The service can have outages and be slow at peak times
- Requires a landline (for FTTC)
- It cannot be moved with you if are moving house or business premises
Broadband providers do not have as much of an incentive to improve service in rural areas as there are less customers there. Businesses and homes are spread out few and far between. Highly congested areas like towns and cities retain the focus of broadband providers, leaving behind those who live in a rural community.
The rollout of gigabit capable broadband is also far more difficult in rural areas. As a result, rural locations are normally on the bottom of the roll out list.
