FTTC or EFM? Both are legacy - the modern connectivity choice

What each product was for

FTTC ran fibre to the street cabinet and copper into the building, giving up to around 80Mbps down and 20Mbps up on a shared, best-efforts basis. EFM bonded copper pairs to deliver a lower but symmetrical and guaranteed rate with an SLA. Businesses chose FTTC for price and EFM for certainty.

Why the comparison is now historic

The copper network underneath both is being retired as the analogue switch-off completes. FTTC survives for now in a modified form as SOGEA, which is the same access technology without the phone line. EFM has largely stopped being sold. Meanwhile full fibre has reached the majority of UK premises, which removes the reason either product existed.

The modern equivalents

• FTTC or SOGEA is replaced by FTTP, full fibre to the premises, with far higher speeds and better upload
• EFM is replaced by a fibre leased line, which is symmetrical and uncontended with a contracted fix time
• 5G fixed wireless covers the gap where neither is available yet, or provides a diverse second path

Deciding without over-engineering it

Pick FTTP if the site is a normal office, the applications are cloud-based, and an outage is disruptive rather than trading-stopping. Pick a leased line if the site trades over the connection, hosts services, runs a contact centre, or is committed to customer service levels that depend on being reachable.

If you still have FTTC or EFM

• Find out what is available at the address today, because it will have changed since the last renewal
• Get the leased line quote as well as the fibre quote; the gap is smaller than most people expect
• Migrate before you are given a date, so the timetable is yours
• Keep the old circuit in parallel over the cutover and test voice quality before you cease it