I’ve been very critical of Rogers when it comes to their Internet offerings. Most recently I said this when Bell rolled out 3 Gbps :
Rogers with their current cable offering can only hit a maximum speed of 1 Gbps downstream and a rather pathetic and uncompetitive 30 Mbps upstream. Which when compared to this new offering from Bell isn’t in the same league.
Well, it seems that Rogers still has some fight left in them. The company announced this today:
As leaders in network technology, Rogers announced today that it has successfully completed tests in both lab and customer trials of download and upload speeds of up to 8 Gigabits per second (Gbps) on its fibre-powered network, more than doubling the fastest published Internet speeds of any major provider in Canada. Building on its commitment to provide leading next-generation products and services to its customers, the potential of 8 Gbps speeds will elevate and future-proof home broadband with more bandwidth, making it even easier to stream, work, surf, and game online on even more devices simultaneously.
If they can actually roll this out to homes and it hits these speeds, then Rogers is back in the game. But before you stop traffic and hold a parade outside the Rogers HQ at 1 Mount Pleasant Rd, there’s this:
Rogers new Ignite Internet, offering download and upload speeds of 8 Gbps, will be available in Summer 2022 for customers in select areas across Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland.
That “select areas” part is what gets my attention. That could mean that Rogers is rolling this out to new developments rather than existing areas that Rogers serves. Which means that if you’re a existing Rogers customer, you might not see any benefit from this announcement. At least not for a very long time. Thus why this is a great announcement, it would be in Rogers best interest to disclose where this will be rolled out specifically and get it into as many places as possible ASAP. Otherwise this will end up being a nothing announcement.