New Record Internet Speed Could Download Entire Netflix Library in Mere Seconds

If you’re old enough to remember the days of 56k modems and dial-up internet, you know how painfully slow it was just to download a photo or a low-quality MP3. HD video was pretty much out of the question. Downloading a single DVD on a 56k connection, even if it was performing perfectly, would take more than a week. Downloading the entire Netflix library, which is roughly 100TB, would take nearly 453 years. But engineers from UCL have managed to set a new internet speed record of 178 terabits per second, which would make it possible to download the Netflix library in less than five seconds.

The University College of London press release for this research states that the Netflix library could be downloaded in under a second, but that seems to be a mistake — likely due to a misunderstanding of the difference between a terabytes and terabits. It’s also worth noting that Netflix doesn’t have any official statement on how much space their library takes up, and the 100TB figure is just an estimate for every available video in HD format. But what isn’t disputed is that 178 Tbit/s is very fast. According to the press release, that’s a fifth faster than the previous record. It’s also 178,000 times faster than the gigabit internet that is the fastest option for most Americans.

The UCL engineers were able to achieve those blistering speeds by dramatically increasing the bandwidth used in their fiber optic transmissions. Most fiber optic infrastructure today is designed for a bandwidth of 4.5THz. Some specialized 9THz bandwidth commercial lines are just starting to be deployed. This 178Tbps connection utilizes a much broader 16.8THz of bandwidth, which allows for far higher throughput. Furthermore, they developed new Geometric Shaping constellations, which are the properties of the light sent through the fiber optic line, that are optimized for this bandwidth. That makes it possible to achieve this speed using existing fiber optic cables, simply by upgrading the amplifiers. You won’t, of course, be getting those speeds in your home, but this would improve telecom infrastructure and ultimately your residential internet performance.