Community Fibre vs Sky

Community Fibre is a dedicated London full fibre broadband provider offering cheaper prices and faster speeds than Sky.

Sky, on the other hand, are more widely available, with 98% coverage in London and 97% in the UK. They also offer a more premium TV service with exclusive discounts when bundled with broadband.

Community Fibre is the top choice for their lower prices, but for those who want a more all-round service, Sky and their bundles are hard to beat.

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At a glance

Best deals

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Price

Winner: Community Fibre offer cheaper prices overall than Sky, especially for broadband only deals.

Community Fibre broadband deals are competitively priced and beat Sky at every level when we're considering broadband only packages.

Their cheapest plan costs just £18.99 per month and comes with average download speeds of 150Mbps. Customers would have to pay £28 per month with Sky to get the same download speed, while even their cheapest plan costs £26 per month:

Both providers are currently offering free setup, with Sky refunding the upfront £5 against a customer's first bill. Community Fibre do offer more flexibility with different contract lengths, but their cheapest plans are found on their 24-month terms.

When Sky could work out cheaper is households wanting a home phone line, with Sky including this as standard, while Community Fibre charge an extra £10 per month. Sky also offer discounts of around £10 for customers who bundle their broadband with Sky TV.

Overall however, Community Fibre are far cheaper than Sky broadband, so will save Londoners the most money for a straightforward full fibre broadband connection.

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Broadband packages

Winner: Community Fibre offer more flexibility of choice on their broadband packages than Sky does, and also offers similar optional extras - although Sky's are superior.

Community Fibre and Sky offer a range of superfast and ultrafast broadband deals, allowing customers to choose between the lowest prices on superfast plans and faster download speeds for larger households on ultrafast and even gigabit-capable deals.

Here's how the cheapest superfast broadband deals from Community Fibre and Sky look side-by-side:

Because of their current special offer on 150Mb Fibre Broadband, Community Fibre customers can access speeds over four times faster than with Sky for less money each month.

There are a few things to note here, some of which we'll go into more detail about later in this Community Fibre vs Sky broadband guide. For a full breakdown read our reviews of Community Fibre and Sky broadband here.

Community Fibre stride ahead in terms of flexibility with contract length, offering customers the choice of 12, 18, and 24-month terms. Sky only offers 24-month contracts. Although note that shorter terms with Community Fibre do cost more than the prices listed above.

In terms of optional extras, both providers offer a WiFi guarantee, and both allow customers to bundle home phone and a TV plan, although the services Sky offers are superior to those of Community Fibre.

Sky includes a home phone line as standard with pay as you go calls, and anytime calls cost as extra £16 per month. Community Fibre customers, on the other hand, would have to pay £10 per month to gain a home phone line, but this comes bundled with UK anytime calls.

For TV options, Sky offer customers the option to bundle Sky TV and this can save around £10 per month on taking the subscriptions separately. Community Fibre also offer a TV plan in partnership with Netgem, but this is arguably a more limited service than Sky offers.

Overall, while Community Fibre are an easy choice for those on a budget, customers who want a little more may be better served by Sky's broadband bundles.

Ultrafast broadband

Community Fibre and Sky both offer a 500Mbps ultrafast broadband package, with Community Fibre offering the cheaper plan again.

Here's how their ultrafast packages look side-by-side:

Community Fibre also offer a 300Mb Fibre Broadband plan for just £21 per month, and with customers getting a WiFi 6 enabled router at no extra cost, it offers exceptional value for money.

For Sky customers who want to upgrade their router to WiFi 6 they'll need to factor in an additional £3 per month for the WiFi Max add-on. Although, this does also include their WiFi guarantee and up to three Plume WiFi pods.

Gigabit broadband

Lastly, customers can also choose a gigabit-capable plan from Community Fibre and Sky, although again, Community Fibre is the cheaper option.

Here's Community Fibre and Sky's gigabit packages:

One benefit to Community Fibre here is they bundle their best devices on faster plans, with those taking the 1Gb plan receiving a tri-band WiFi 6 device. It's also possible to take Premium WiFi, Community Fibre's WiFi guarantee with this plan, although it costs £32 per month, so an extra £6 per month.

Sky Gigafast comes with the standard Sky Broadband Hub, which supports up to WiFi 5, and as above, if customers want the WiFi 6 enabled Sky Max Hub they'll need to take the WiFi Max add-on for an extra £3 per month.

Overall, Community Fibre offer a wide range of download speed choices and cheaper prices across all equivalent deals compared to Sky broadband. Where Sky might win out however is for customers looking for a TV bundle deal.

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TV

Winner: Sky TV remains the service to beat and is streets ahead of the Netgem TV service offered by Community Fibre.

Sky TV is the champion of pay TV in the UK offering over 150 channels in their base package, plus Netflix Standard with Ads, and options to add to Sky Cinema, Sky Sports and more through their channel add-ons.

Sky TV costs from £23 per month, but it can be taken in a bundle with Sky broadband saving customers around £10 per month over taking the services separately:

Sky Stream the provider's new satellite-dish free service that sends the TV signal over the broadband line and only requires a broadband connection. The Stream Puck Box also offers support for a wide range of on-demand apps, including Prime Video, Paramount+, Apple TV+, Discovery+, Hayu, and more.

All Sky TV plans also come with Netflix Standard with Ads, Discovery+ Standard, and the Sky Cinema pack also bundles Paramount+.

There are more Sky TV and broadband bundles available with faster download speeds and more content on our Sky TV bundles page.

Meanwhile, Community Fibre have partnered with Netgem TV to offer their broadband customers a pay TV service starting at £10 per month.

Community Fibre TV customers receive:

• 230+ live channels, including Freeview channels
• 100,000 hours of on-demand content
• 100+ TV apps, including support for Discovery+, Prime Video, BritBox, and Hayu
• Free 4K TV box with Alexa
• Unlimited use on multiple tablet and mobile devices

Community Fibre customers can also use the box to access apps from other services in the same way the Sky Q box can.

Overall, there's simply no contest if we're looking at the most comprehensive TV service with the largest number of options: it's Sky TV every time.

However, customers could take Sky TV without Sky broadband, potentially taking their broadband from Community Fibre instead. That may be a useful option for customers who like the look of Community Fibre's broadband but want a full TV service too.

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Broadband speed

Winner: Community Fibre offers faster download speeds than Sky broadband, as well as symmetrical upload speeds on all plans.

Community Fibre currently offer five main broadband speed choices to customers:

There is a sixth option, but while fast the 3Gb plan isn't available to all homes on the Community Fibre network, meaning most customers would be better suited to their 920Mb plan.

Meanwhile, Sky's six broadband speed choices include:

It's easy to see then that even though Sky offer a full fibre broadband connection with their Ultrafast, Ultrafast Plus and Gigafast plans, Community Fibre offers the fastest service with their 920Mb and 3Gb options.

Community Fibre also use full fibre connections for all of their broadband packages, including the superfast 75Mb plans. Whereas Sky's superfast plans use the Openreach fibre to the cabinet (FTTC) network, which can see more attenuation (slowing down) depending on how far a customer lives from their nearest street cabinet and exchange.

This means customers opting for the slower Community Fibre packages are likely to receive a more stable connection that delivers the headline speed more reliably, in comparison to equivalent plans with Sky broadband on FTTC lines.

However, much of this depends on availability, with customers living in Openreach FTTP areas only able to order Sky full fibre broadband, even on their superfast packages. At which point, technology and reliability is much more on a par with Community Fibre's network.

Read more about the fastest broadband providers in the UK.

Upload speeds

Community Fibre offers symmetrical download and upload speeds to their customers. This means their entry-level package offers both 75Mb downloads and uploads to customers.

Symmetrical speeds can be a feature of full fibre broadband, but it's worth pointing out that some other providers, including Sky, don't offer them. The maximum they offer on their Gigafast plan is 90Mb.

If upload speeds are important to a household, for example for gaming broadband, Community Fibre is again the winner.

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Router

Winner: Community Fibre offer more advanced routers designed for delivering the fastest home WiFi experience.

Customers signing up to the slowest 75Mb broadband plan from Community Fibre will receive a Linksys Velop Dual-Band Intelligent Mesh router, while customers on higher plans will receive the newer Linksys WiFi 6 Intelligent Mesh device instead.

The newly updated device for 2024 offers support for WiFi 6, along with 6 internal antennae and dual-band wireless channels, along with MU-MIMO, band steering and beam-forming technology.

The Linksys Velop Intelligent Mesh routers can be paired to extend wi-fi coverage

The Linksys routers all support mesh, so they can act as their own wi-fi booster system when multiple devices are used together.

Sky provide their broadband customers with the Sky Broadband Hub, a dual-band WiFi 5 router with 8 internal antennae and 4 gigabit ethernet ports.

Sky broadband customers get the Sky Broadband Hub

Sky customers can upgrade to the WiFi 6 enabled Sky Max Hub, but will have to pay £3 extra per month for the WiFi Max add-on, although this does also bundle their WiFi guarantee.

Overall, while Sky's broadband router is sufficient, the Linksys devices offered by Community Fibre are more advanced, particularly for customers taking the 150Mb and upwards plans.

WiFi guarantees

Both Sky and Community Fibre offer a WiFi guarantee add-on. While Community Fibre's Premium WiFi service costs twice that of Sky's WiFi Max, it also promises faster download speeds too.

Sky customers can add Sky WiFi Max to any package from just £3 per month. WiFi Max promises minimum download speeds of at least 25Mb in every room by providing additional mesh boosters for a customer to install. Those on part-fibre plans will be promised up to 10Mbps.

Sky will refund the cost of one month's broadband subscription if customers are unable to get the 25Mb speeds in every room in their home. Customers also benefit from daily line checks and free off-peak engineer visits, as well as 2GB data on Sky Mobile if the fixed line connection ever goes down.

Community Fibre offer customers who take their 1Gb or 3Gb plans the choice to add the Premium WiFi service. It costs around £6 more per month, but also promises faster minimum download speeds of 35Mb in every room.

Premium WiFi is installed by engineers specifically, using additional Linksys mesh routers to extend the wireless coverage around a home. If the service fails to deliver customers get three month's broadband subscription refunded.

Overall, while both providers offer a reasonable WiFi boosting service, Community Fibre's is better than Sky's because it promises faster minimum download speeds, although the downside is its only available with their fastest plans.

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Call plans

Winner: Sky has more call plan options available than Community Fibre, their broadband deals also include a home phone line as standard.

Community Fibre broadband comes without a home phone unless customers pay £10 extra per month to access a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) line.

For this £10 they receive:

• Unlimited calls to UK landlines and mobiles
• Features such as 1471, 1571 Voicemail and call barring

However, the line doesn't support calls to premium numbers or international calls, so customers making a lot of those may not be satisfied by the Community Fibre call plan.

Sky's call plan options are more comprehensive and a Pay As You Talk phone line is included with every broadband deal as standard.

Customers can add the following call plans:

While anytime calls are slightly more expensive on Sky, the option to add international calls or simply take a cheaper evening and weekends plan may appeal to some customers. Note also that Sky call plans come with an 24-month contract.

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Customer service

Winner: Tie - both Sky and Community Fibre have great customer service records.

The best information we have on Community Fibre's customer service comes from Trustpilot where they are the top provider in the broadband category.

With a 4.5 score of Excellent from over 44,000 reviews, Community Fibre have 90% of reviews labelling them as Excellent while only 5% say they a Bad provider.

We don't have any independent analysis of Community Fibre's customer service, however, since they are such a niche provider.

On the other hand, Ofcom include Sky in their customer service reports and quarterly complaint figures.

From these, we can see their most recent complaints history is market-leading with only 6 broadband complaints per 100,000 customers in Q1 2024, less than half the industry average of 11.

Throughout all of 2023, Sky's overall complaint levels were the lowest in the market, and they performed well in several customer service categories including satisfaction with complaint handling and successfully resolving complaints on first contact.

Given Community Fibre's strong record on Trustpilot and Sky's good figures confirmed by Ofcom, we can't choose between them on customer service.

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Availability

Winner: Sky broadband is more widely available than Community Fibre, although faster speeds may be more limited.

Community Fibre is a London-based ISP, but their network only covers around 1.3 million homes across the capital as of November 2023.

They have a presence in nearly all 33 London boroughs, with plans to expand into the remaining borough of Havering soon. In addition, they say they have a more extensive presence Brent, Camden, Croydon, Hammersmith & Fulham, Newham, Southwark, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth and Westminster.

Community Fibre also have availability south of London, in surrounding Surrey and Sussex, since taking over Box broadband and merging them into their existing network.

Sky's superfast broadband on the other hand can be access by the vast majority of homes across London with Thinkbroadband data saying 98% of Londoners can access superfast broadband of 30Mb or more.

For Sky full fibre broadband, availability is around 34% of homes, which is approximately 1.2 million, although Openreach FTTP is steadily rolling out so this figure should increase in the near future.

It's possible for many homes that some may be able to get Sky full fibre but not Community Fibre, and vice versa, with fewer locations having the choice between either provider.

Availability remains an issue for ultrafast broadband services, something that will frustrate customers who like what they've read in this guide but can't sign up just yet.

For more see this guide to the best broadband in London.

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Verdict: Community Fibre or Sky broadband?

Overall Winner: Community Fibre triumph in most categories over Sky, despite being exclusively available in London and even then their availability is still limited.

Community Fibre and Sky are very different providers.

Community Fibre is a specialist London ISP, so their deals are only going to be available to customers in the capital, whereas Sky is a nationwide provider.

Yet Community Fibre has an extremely strong proposition for customers. They offer:

• Cheaper broadband deals than Sky
• Faster broadband
• More advanced routers
• Full fibre connections as standard

Plus, while they may be inferior to Sky's deals, it's also possible to get a home phone and a TV service with Community Fibre too.

On the other hand, Sky has some key strengths too:

• Superfast broadband is available to over 98% of London homes, with 34% able to access full fibre broadband
• More accessible WiFi guarantee and router upgrade available on all plans
• TV service is comprehensive with good discounts for bundling
• More call plan options

Ultimately, if customers have a choice between these two providers, those favouring speed will often opt for Community Fibre while those who want a comprehensive TV service from their broadband provider will opt for Sky.

Most customers will be lucky to get the choice right now though, so it could come down to whether Community Fibre is available in an area yet.

Virgin Media is another strong option for Londoners. Find out if Virgin Media is available in your area. We look at Community Fibre vs Virgin Media and Sky vs Virgin Media to see which is the best option.