Gabriel Vanca | July 11th, 2023

Sky Ultrafast: 145Mb fibre broadband package

Sky is one of the largest UK broadband providers and the Sky Broadband Ultrafast is one of its mid-tier packages, delivering average speeds of 145Mbps.

Key features

Here’s a quick rundown of what you get with Sky Broadband Superfast.

Price	£0 per month
Download speed	0Mbps
Upload speed	0Mbps
Broadband	FTTC, GFast, FTTP, Full Fibre
Home Phone	Line rental included
Parental controls	Broadband Shield, Broadband Buddy
Router	Sky Broadband Hub
Packages available	Broadband & phone, Broadband & phone & TV
Contract length	-

Who is Sky Ultrafast for?

Sky Broadband Ultrafast is one of Sky’s mid-tier broadband packages, delivering download speeds of 145Mbps and upload speeds of 27Mbps. That means that it’s great for everything from gaming to watching your favourite TV show in very high resolutions.

Here’s a quick rundown of who’d want Broadband Ultrafast and why:

• Households with 3-5 occupants – This package will be adequate for medium households with about 15 devices or less
• Gamers – Sky Broadband Ultrafast will be more than enough to play any online games, but it will take you between one and two hours to download some of the latest generations of very large games
• Several streaming devices – Streaming Ultra-HD (4K) content can require anything from under 20Mbps (Netflix and Amazon Prime) up to almost 50Mbps (Apple TV+ and YouTube), so Ultrafast will be ideal if you’ve got more than two devices streaming at the same time
• Cloud storage – If you rely on a cloud storage platform (e.g. iCloud, Dropbox, Google Drive) for storing those photos you’ve taken with your smartphone or for those important files you don’t want to lose, Sky Broadband Ultrafast will ensure that you can quickly access them

How does Sky Ultrafast compare?

Sky Broadband Ultrafast is mainly available through the newer and faster FTTP technology (where a fast fibre cable comes all the way to your property), though in select areas it is also available through GFast FTTC (where the fast fibre cable only goes to a cabinet on your street and then a slower copper cable connects your house to that cabinet). That means that the Ultrafast package is available to only a fraction of the households which can get Sky’s entry-level packages.

Let’s take a quick look at how Broadband Ultrafast compares to the other Sky Fibre packages:

What is included with Broadband Ultrafast?

As with all other packages, Sky Broadband Ultrafast has no data limits.

The package comes with the Sky Broadband Hub router as standard, one of the more premium routers among the large broadband providers. With its eight wifi antennae (more than competitors), the Hub provides rich wireless coverage throughout your home and a low latency connection.

Sky Broadband Hub Router Specifications

• Current gen WiFi – The Sky Broadband Hub uses the ubiquitous wireless standard WiFi 5 (802.11ac) introduced in 2013
• VDSL2/ADSL 2+ – VDSL2 means the hub can be connected by super-fast fibre optic cable to your home (once it becomes available), while ADSL2+ means you can also connect via a phone line
• Smart channel selection – The Smart Hub automatically connects your devices to the fastest wifi channel and frequency available
• Smart scan – The router continually checks your network connection as well as its own performance and automatically reboots if there's a problem
• Dual band – Like most modern routers, the Sky Broadband Hub uses one 2.4GHz band and one 5GHz band
• Four Gigabit ethernet ports – The Sky Broadband Hub has four gigabit Ethernet ports, so you can wire directly four different devices (or more if you purchase a network switch)
• Eight antennae – Thanks to its eight in-built antennae, the Sky Broadband Hub can provide strong WiFi coverage throughout your home
• Reduced latency when gaming – The Sky Broadband Hub supports 4x4 MIMo (four antennas for four simultaneous data streams), which means that wireless devices can communicate simultaneously with the router without having to wait so often for each other, therefore greatly improving latency
• Internet calls – Sky Broadband Hub has a VOIP handset socket to allow the connection of an internet phone handset
• Support for many devices – Up to 64 devices can be connected wirelessly

Extras

Sky Broadband Shield is a free router feature that provides parental control (Safe Search) as well as protection against malware-infected and scam (phishing) websites.

As all Sky broadband packages, Ultrafast comes with free line rental, and the phone service works on a pay as you go basis. Evenings & Weekends, Anytime and International packages are available for a monthly fee.

Also for a small monthly fee, you can get a suite of extra benefits known as Sky Broadband Boost. This includes Sky’s WiFi Guarantee which promises wifi coverage in every room (at least 3Mbps). If that fails, Sky will either send an engineer to help you set up the Hub in a better location, or it will set you up with the Sky WiFi Booster, which extends the wifi coverage of the Hub.

Other Boost benefits include daily automated checks of the line (for speed and reliability), engineer visits at no extra cost and if you’re a Sky Mobile customer and suffer a significant unplanned broadband outage, you’ll get an extra 2GB of mobile data. You also get the Sky Broadband Buddy app which enables you to limit the time members of the family spend on various mobile apps and enables parental control even when kids are away from home.

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What we think

Sky is a very well-rated provider that enjoys great customer satisfaction, and the Sky Broadband Ultrafast package lives up to Sky’s reputation. The package provides a robust and reliable service that will be a great match for medium-sized households.

While the package is not the cheapest in its speed tier, Sky more than compensates for the premium price through its great customer service, unrivalled technical support, premium router and well-priced TV bundle deals.