Argentina's fixed internet costs rise to 4% of average household income

The cost of fixed internet services as a proportion of the average income of Argentines climbed to 4% in May from 3% in August 2023, putting it above the UN's affordability threshold, which has been at 2% since 2018.

The average cost of internet nationally is 20,035 pesos per month (US$22), according to the latest report from internet chamber Cabase, based on a survey carried out mainly in the four most heavily populated provinces (Buenos Aires, Santa Fe, Córdoba and Mendoza) and federal capital Buenos Aires.

Fixed internet penetration reached 88% of Argentine households, up 2.5 percentage points compared with August last year. Of the households that lack fixed internet services, 41.5% use mobile internet and 36.75% share a wireless service with a neighbor.

Some 50.8% of households that previously had fixed internet but now do not (79.7% of those that lack fixed internet) said they cancelled the service due to the high cost.

The study indicated that, due to the economic crisis, 67.5% of Argentine households had to take some palliative measure to reduce the price they paid for fixed internet. In the case of pay-TV, that percentage was 65.3%, while in mobile telephony the figure was 57.6% and fixed telephony 59.0%.

Those measures include requesting cancellation, asking for a discount and changing suppliers to obtain a better price.

However, permanent cancellation requests still remain at low rates, reaching only 1.2% in the case of fixed telephony, 1.9% in fixed internet and 3.0% in mobile telephony and pay-TV. However, cancellations were more common with streaming services, reaching 10%.

This is explained by the discounts offered by telecommunications providers to retain customers. In the case of fixed internet, 44% of users requested cancellation, but obtained a discount, a figure that reached 47.5% in the case of pay-TV and 52.2% in mobile telephony.

AVAILABILITY OF SERVICES

Some 53% of internet access in Argentine is via fiber optics, 26.9% via cable modem, 9.75% wireless, 8.44% ADSL and 2.49% satellite, while 35.7% of respondents access services with download speeds above 100Mbps and 26.3% have internet speeds of 50-100Mbps.

A total of 66% of households have contracted other services packaged with their internet service, with 47% having internet plus one other service (mobile telephony or pay-TV) and 19% contract all three. Meanwhile, 89% of households have contracted streaming services.