FTTH / FTTP master sockets

My street now has a choice between gigabit-speed broadband from ISPs that use Openreach infrastructure and YouFibre who have recently upgraded the telephone pole near my home.

My question is: is the hardware into which the router/modem is plugged the same across FTTC providers? The YouFibre offering is symmetric gigabit download/upload, in contrast with the BTOpenreach-based offering which provides gigabit downloads but only 115Mbps upload, so if I were to have YouFibre installed and didn't like it, could the same hardware to the internal wall be used for a seamless BTOR-based service?

In a nutshell no.

Each of these fibre networks is discrete. They share no commonality other than perhaps fixing to the same Openreach poles or being routed through the same ducts. As such their terminating equipment belongs to each physical network provider. This is the ONT - optical network termination. These are locked to and administered by each respective network, Openreach or YouFibre. They follow similar-ish architecture GPON or XGS-PON but are not really interchangeable between the two.

If you wanted service from each network, then each would have to lead-in their own cable and their own termination point and ONT. From there on in you could use your own router however. So the router could be re-used, (or indeed with both networks simultaneously) albeit with different settings to match.

By the way it’s all FTTP rather than FTTC

Edited by Pheasant (Thu 20-Feb-25 17:45:23)

To answer you simply, if you want to switch from YouFibre to an Openreach ISP (or vice versa) you need a second fibre cable and associated equipment installed into the property.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

In a nutshell no.

Each of these fibre networks is discrete. They share no commonality other than perhaps fixing to the same Openreach poles or being routed through the same ducts. As such their terminating equipment belongs to each physical network provider. This is the ONT - optical network termination. These are locked to and administered by each respective network, Openreach or YouFibre. They follow similar-ish architecture GPON or XGS-PON but are not really interchangeable between the two.

If you wanted service from each network, then each would have to lead-in their own cable and their own termination point and ONT. From there on in you could use your own router however. So the router could be re-used, (or indeed with both networks simultaneously) albeit with different settings to match.

By the way it’s all FTTP rather than FTTC

Thanks and yes I did mean FTTP

others have explained perfectly that the services upto the ont are different. One thing with fttp as it share bandwith other users, the whole sale network extends right up to the ont.

In reply to a post by Taras:

others have explained perfectly that the services upto the ont are different. One thing with fttp as it share bandwith other users, the whole sale network extends right up to the ont.

The fibre cable from my house to the local Gigaclear cabinet is not shared with anyone else.

In your particular area, Gigaclear’s FTTP network is “point-to-point” rather than PON so it’s effectively a straight Ethernet connection back to the switch (where all the other local drop connections terminate).

At that point the uplink connection from the switch to their next point of network aggregation, likely the local / regional POP, is contended / shared amongst all subscribers on that switch.

So what you say is technically true, but only to a point, before it again becomes contended in the distribution network if the service provider. This is broadband after all.