Our overall rating: 7 out of 10
Owned by Sky, NOW Broadband has a very different appeal from its parent company. For starters it’s much cheaper with prices well below most of the other big providers. It also proudly offers what most others keep hidden – a rolling one-month contract (this carries a £65 activation charge). No credit check is run or needed either for any of its contracts.
So, what’s the ‘but’? In this case, the big downside comes in speed. There are just three options to pick from and none of these are superfast full fibre. However, this might not be a concern for some households.
The positives
The negatives
In our full review we take a look at the pros and cons of each area in more detail: speed, cost, setup and customer service.
Now Broadband offers three straight-forward packages with varying speeds. But remember, where you live will also play a factor. We’ll list everything below, but you’ll also need to check your postcode to see what is currently available.
Find out what broadband is available to you with our postcode checker:
Speed is often the biggest consideration when choosing a broadband package. If you have multiple people using the internet at one time, then a higher speed and bandwidth will be essential. Equally, if it’s a small household using the internet for everyday usage, paying for business-grade bandwidth will probably end up being a waste.
You should decide what speed is right for you, based on your broadband habits at home. Here’s a handy guide to help show what bandwidth usage your different applications need.
Brilliant Broadband
With average download speeds of 11Mbps, this package is on the slow side and not suitable for anyone needing to work from home. You’d be better off spending slightly more a month and opting for the other two fibre packages.
NOW Fab Fibre
This entry-level fibre optic service has average download speeds of 36Mbps at peak times. Fine for small households and light users.
Super Broadband
NOW’s fastest service doesn’t require a full fibre connection to run. It’s more than enough for a household requiring some light streaming or working from home.
Does NOW Broadband offer any full fibre options? The short answer to this is – no. Not yet, anyway. They have ADSL and superfast broadband only.
It’s two faster packages use fibre to the cabinet broadband. FTTC is an internet connection that runs along fibre optic cables from the telephone exchange to the green roadside cabinets in your street. What stops it being full fibre is that a copper line is then run from this cabinet to the households.
That’s not to say that NOW Broadband’s packages don’t give a smooth and fast connection, they do, you just won’t get the same speeds and results as you would from full fibre.
FTTP, also known as full fibre, is the next generation of broadband. It removes the need to rely on copper phone lines and instead connects fibre cables straight to your home. This means there’s no slowdown on the data between the street cabinet and your property and the speed and strength are much more powerful than any previous fibre broadband technology as a result. Common internet issues like buffering and outages become almost nonexistent.
NOW Broadband uses the well-established and reliable Openreach network for all its packages. Openreach is the physical network (the wires under the street and the boxes on the street) and the biggest telecommunications network in the UK.
The Ofcom’s 2023 report doesn’t include full figures for customer’s satisfaction with NOW broadband’s connectivity due to the sample size being too low. However, in 'Customers with a reason to complain, NOW Broadband scores 10%, which is actually the top score of all broadband providers (20% average score).
Starting from £20, NOW Broadband offers some of the lowest costs available. But remember, the speed is reflective of the price. Also to be noted, unless there is a special offer, NOW normally charges a set-up fee, so you’ll probably have to pay something for installation.
Average price guide
One of Now Broadband’s big attraction is its flexibility. As well as 12-month contracts, it also offers one-month rolling contracts. Perfect if you are looking for any short-term options. These normally have the same monthly price as their longer-term equivalents, but just be aware that there will be a much higher setup fee at the beginning to factor in.
Line rental is included with all NOW Broadband packages for no extra cost. There are three options for you then pay for calls:
There are various flexible streaming TV options you can add on to selected plans as NOW TV Passes starting from £6.99 per month. Pick from from entertainment, sports, cinema or reality packages which all come with a good handful of freeview channels too.
Gift cards or cashback incentives aren’t a feature for NOW, but it does sometimes run special offers where you can free setup or a discounted monthly price thrown in.
In July 2023 NOW Broadband increased its prices for the first time since its 2018 launch by £3.50 a month. The provider gave allowance for customers affected to leave within 31 days of this notification without incurring a penalty. This was more lenient than other big providers who increased their 2023 prices by up to 14.21% and didn’t give an opportunity to leave.
If you’re already on another Openreach provider, switching to Now Broadband is easy and can be done remotely within two weeks of ordering. You probably will be as most providers operate through this network, the main exception is Virgin Media. If this is the case, you might have the extra task of getting a phone line installed, or making an old one active again. If you do need an engineer to install a new telephone line NOW don’t add an extra charge for this.
NOW Broadband Wi-Fi routers
All NOW Broadband deals come with a NOW Hub 2. This is a rebranded Sky Q Hub with decent specs considering the low cost service.
It gives a smart channel selection, five antennae, two gigabit ethernet ports, ac standard Wi-Fi and dual band tech. Connect your Hub Two to your master phone socket for the best speed and stability as this is where your broadband signal is strongest.
If you are having an internet connection installed, the engineer will connect the router and test it’s working. If you’re setting it up yourself, the router will be sent out to you and you can simply connect the network cable to the network socket and follow the instructions to join your device to Wi-Fi and you’re all ready to go.
We always look at Ofcom’s latest customer service report for our results on this and due to its customer database sample size being too low, there isn’t a direct score available.
However, in 'Customers with a reason to complain, NOW Broadband scores 10%, which is actually the top score of all broadband providers (20% average score). It also has an exceptionally quick call waiting time of just 51 seconds (average 2 mins 37 seconds).
If you want to speak to a human being, NOW Broadband customer service is available daily from 8am to 8pm, seven days a week.
Existing customers call: 0330 332 3050
New customers call: 0330 332 3050
Facebook: facebook.com/NOWTV/
Twitter/X: @NOWHelpTeam
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