Japan shatters internet speed record

Ever had a movie or web series constantly buffering? Or turned in an assignment due at midnight at exactly 11:59, only for it to have still been submitted late? The culprit here, you guessed it, is slow internet connectivity. But all these could soon be a thing of the past.

A group of researchers at Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) seemed to have found the answer to all our woes. They have reportedly managed to achieve internet speeds of a whopping 402 Terabits per second (Tbps) or 402,000 Gbps, shattering all previous records.

What could internet speeds of up to 402 Tbps mean for you?

Researchers at the Photonic Network Laboratory of NICT used commercially available ordinary fibre optic cables, which are the backbone of the internet globally, to achieve internet connectivity speeds of as much as 402 Tbps. Using this, you could theoretically download as many as 12,500 films on Netflix, in the highest possible quality in under a second on your smartphones and laptops.

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To put things into perspective, this is nearly 1.6 million times faster than the average broadband speed in the US, which ranks sixth in the world at 248.27 Mbps, as per the Ookla Speedtest Global Index. India for your reference, ranks 92nd currently with average broadband speeds of around 64.22 Mbps.

How did the researchers at NICT achieve this?

While the standard Wi-Fi in our home uses GHz waves (2.4GHz or 5GHz), the researchers used THz waves instead. One THz is equal to 1,000GHz. With state-of-the-art amplifiers, the researchers achieved 402 Tbps at 37.6THz. Needless to say,  these speeds are far beyond any current Wi-Fi or 5G network speeds.

Such internet speeds have the potential to change how entire industries work. Whether it is with regards to scope for remote work or real-time collaboration on projects. But, is it possible to make such speeds commercially available just yet? As it turns out, no. Not in the near future at least. This is because such high-speed links are too expensive to deploy commercially. They would also require high-speed ethernet ports and storage devices to handle that kind of bandwidth. However, with advancements in technology, the overall costs are expected to reduce in the coming years. This could result in a wider availability of high-speed internet.