Technology advances and every time we have better devices, greater internet speed and, in short, more possibilities for our day to day. Without a doubt, having a good connection is essential. We have many services that need to be permanently connected to the network. We have seen that in recent years fiber optics has caused an important change in this regard. How far can speed go? We echo a new record that they have managed to beat in Japan.
Japan breaks any internet speed barrier
A group of engineers from Japan have achieved a new record for the Internet speed ever achieved. They have specifically achieved 319 Tbps. This group belongs to the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology. They have presented these results at this year’s International Conference on Fiber Optic Communications.
It is certainly a really remarkable speed, but even more so if we compare it with the current record, which was 178 Tbps and which was achieved just a year ago. Furthermore, the record prior to the latter was 44 Tbps. Therefore, we can say that we are seeing more than important advances in Internet speed in a very short time.
Will we have speeds of this type in our homes in a few years? Keep in mind that currently in Spain the maximum speed that we can hire is 1 Gbps. In addition, the maximum achieved at the domestic level for now is about 10 Gbps.
It is clear that the gap between current connections and the record they have achieved in Japan is more than evident. However, if we look back we can see that not too long ago we had Internet connections that barely reached 20 Mbps. Even if we go a little further back we will remember the 56K connections.
It is logical to think that in a few years the fiber optic speed base that we are going to have in our homes is 1 Gbps symmetric. We can also say that 10 Gbps, with the right hardware for it, will be a general reality in no time.
But yes, we will have to wait a lot longer to achieve even a tenth of that record reached by this group of Japanese researchers.
Do we need that much speed?
When we see records of this type being broken as we have indicated, we can ask ourselves if we really need that much speed. The truth is that if we think about the use that we currently give to the network, the services and applications that we use, we can understand that it is not necessary to have 319 Tbps.
It is the same as if we put ourselves in the situation of a few years ago, when we had speeds that barely exceeded 15 Mbps. It was not so frequent to use streaming services where we can watch high-quality videos on platforms like Netflix, for example.
However now, at present we can see such a speed as something very limited. We would have problems playing streaming videos in 4K, even more so if we use several devices at the same time.
Therefore, we can say that in a few years with total probability the needs of having a good connection they will be very different from the current ones. Perhaps what we now see as a great Internet speed, such as 1 Gbps fiber optic, in a decade will be something too basic.