BT announces record Wi-Fi usage

BT figures show record Wi-Fi usage

BT has announced that its Wi-Fi customers are using more minutes per month than ever before.

The telco's half-year figures show that the number of Wi-Fi minutes being used per month were up by 100 per cent compared with the same period last year, and up by over 50 per cent against the first half of 2008.

BT said that its Wi-Fi traffic had risen to more than a million minutes a day, roughly eight million minutes per week, in the past six months. The figures show that, in one week in September, BT customers clocked up a record 10 million minutes of usage.

The numbers include users of BT FON, the firm's combined home and mobile phone offering, as well as its BT Openzone Wi-Fi networks.

"It is great to see users embracing broadband on the move, and BT is committed to keeping customers connected with a fast and reliable service in or out of the home or office," said Dave Hughes, director of BT wireless broadband.

"We have already built extensive Wi-Fi coverage with BT Openzone at thousands of popular locations and, as BT FON grows daily, the choice of places to connect is getting better and better."

BT said that the increased Wi-Fi usage followed a trend in the industry, and that figures from the Wi-Fi Alliance had shown an explosion in the number of products and services being certified, released and used.

BT claims that its customers have access to around 120,000 hotspots in the UK.