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An FTTN or Fibre to the Node NBN connection involves a mix of fibre optic cables and the old copper network to deliver the internet to your residence.
FTTN connections are the most common in Australia, with just under 3 million residences using this technology type, or about 34% of NBN connections according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's (ACCC) Wholesale Market Indicators report.
Although it has the biggest share of NBN connections, FTTN has been steadily dropping since May 2022, most likely as people take advantage of NBN fibre upgrades.
A NBN FTTN connection involves fibre cables which run to a node located near a group of properties. Typically, this fibre node is in the form of a street cabinet.
From the node, it then connects with the existing copper network to reach your premises.
With an FTTN connection, since it relies on copper, there's a cap on how fast it can go because of the limitations of the infrastructure.
This translates to only getting speeds up to 100Mbps on an FTTN connection, or up to an NBN 100 plan.
Because it uses a shared node and the length of copper used will also have an effect on overall quality, NBN FTTN plans might not deliver the top speeds described by their respective speed tiers.
The ACCC Measuring Broadband Australia report states that FTTN connections achieve an average download speed during busy hours of 92.7% of the service's plan speed. This is during 7pm-11pm when internet traffic is likely to be heaviest.
Just remember that with NBN connections though, the speed you actually achieve depends on many factors, which include your hardware and the number of people simultaneously online.
Setting up an FTTN connection is easy as there's not really anything that needs to be professionally installed. All you'll need is:
Unless you need a telephone wall socket installed within your premises, no additional equipment will be installed to set up a FTTN connection.
Fibre to the Node is considered the slowest and least reliable of NBN connections due to the amount of copper involved.
Here's a look at how FTTN stacks up against the other NBN connection types:
A Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) connection is where a fibre optic line extends directly from the fibre node to your premises. Since FTTP solely has fibre for its entire connection, without any copper wiring, it is widely acknowledged as the fastest and most dependable NBN option available.
As such, you can get higher speed plans on an FTTP connection like NBN 250 or NBN 1000, which you can't get with FTTN.
FTTN and FTTC (Fibre to the Curb) share a similarity in utilising copper wire for the final segment of the NBN connection. However, the primary distinction lies in the extent of copper wire employed.
In the case of FTTC, the length of copper between the distribution point and the properties connecting via this method is typically less than 300m. On an FTTN connection, the node can be situated up to a kilometre away from the properties.
The transmission of signals through copper cables results in a loss of strength, and the longer the distance, the slower the connection becomes. Consequently, FTTC theoretically offers more reliable speeds compared to FTTN.
An HFC, or Hybrid Fibre Coaxial connection, leverages the existing pay TV or cable network to link your home to an NBN node. Unlike FTTN, which relies on less efficient copper wiring for the final connection, HFC takes advantage of coaxial cable, leading to generally better performance.
FTTB (Fibre To The Building) connections involve running a fibre optic cable to a node in a building's communications room. From there, existing technology within the building is employed to connect each apartment to the NBN.
Because FTTB connections utilise less copper wiring, they are generally considered somewhat superior. This would especially be the case in newer buildings where ethernet cables are installed instead of older copper wiring.
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