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Fibre to the Curb (FTTC) is an NBN connection type where high-speed fibre cables are run to nearby your property, generally in a pit on the street. From there it is connected to your house by copper wires to complete the connection to the NBN network.
According to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's (ACCC) Wholesale Market Indicators report, there are just over 1 million residences using FTTC in Australia, or about 12.3% of NBN connections.
The FTTC connection is where a fibre cable runs near your premises, linking to a distribution point, usually situated inside a pit on the street. From there, the connection is completed by copper wire from that point to your house. 
Wondering where the distribution point units live on your curb? You might have noticed those covered pits, as shown in our photo, with the name of providers like Optus, Telstra or TPG. These are "telecom pits" and contain the distribution points where the fibre optic cables switch over to existing copper wires.
As an FTTC connection uses copper, there's a limit to how fast it can go due to the physical constraints of the infrastructure.
This means you can only get speeds of up to 100Mbps on an FTTC connection, or up to an NBN 100 plan. That said, the short length of copper wire used doesn't significantly degrade the signal.
The Measuring Broadband Australia report said that FTTC connections achieved an average download speed per service during busy hours of 100.9%, exceeding the service's plan speed. This is the period between 7pm and 11pm when internet traffic is most likely to be highest.
Breaking this down though, for an FTTC NBN 100 connection, 97.2% of maximum plan speed was achieved during busy hours. On an NBN 50 connection, FTTC connections reached 104.7% of plan speed during busy hours.
As with all connections though, the connection speed you actually achieve depends on a wide variety of factors, including your hardware, devices and how many people are online at the same time.
There are 2 ways an FTTC connection can be set up at your premises – through an NBN-approved installer or through self-installation. Your internet provider will let you know which option will apply to you.
If you require an installation, it could take up to 2 hours, though in some instances more complex ones may take longer.
If you're doing it yourself, you'll just need:
To complete your set-up, you'll need to plug your NBN connection box into a power outlet and your telephone wall socket. You then connect it to a Wi-Fi modem with an ethernet cable.
FTTC is considered to be on the slower end of NBN connection types. Performance won't be as poor as FTTN, but also won't be close to FTTP due to the copper involved in the connection type.
Here's how FTTC stacks up against the other types of NBN connections:
A Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) connection is what its name suggests – a fibre optic line runs from the node directly to your premises. As FTTP only uses fibre for the entirety of the connection, and not any copper wiring, it is generally considered the fastest and most reliable NBN you can get.
You will be able to achieve higher speeds with an FTTP connection as it allows you to get an NBN 250 or NBN 1000 plan, which you can't do with an FTTC connection.
Keep in mind, you may be eligible for a fibre upgrade in your suburb for the NBN, which means you could upgrade your FTTC connection to FTTP for free.
While FTTC and Fibre to the Node (FTTN) connections are similar in that they both use copper wire for the final part of the connection, the major difference between them is how much copper wire is used.
With FTTC, there is usually less than 300 metres of copper between the distribution point and any of the properties involved. On an FTTN connection, the node itself can be around a kilometre away from properties.
When signals go through copper cables, they lose strength. So the longer the distance, the slower your connection gets. This means that theoretically, FTTC offers more reliable speeds than FTTN.
A Hybrid Fibre Coaxial (HFC) connection uses the existing pay TV or cable network to connect your home from an NBN node. As HFC uses coaxial cable to make the final connection as opposed to less efficient copper wiring used in FTTC, HFC generally exhibits superior performance.
For Fibre To The Building (FTTB) connections, a fibre optic cable is run to a node in a building's communications room and then existing technology in the building is used to connect to each apartment.
As there is less copper wiring used in a FTTB connection, it would be considered slightly better, especially if it's a newer building that has ethernet cable installed instead of copper wiring.
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