What is a Contention Ratio?

Most internet service providers are in the game to provide internet services to the consumer market. This usually means low cost, capped internet plans with various bells and whistles.

The way they deliver these services is to their customers is to buy one large connection (an "uplink") from a wholesale supplier which would cost quite a lot, but connects directly to the "backbone" of the internet. Then they on-sell that uplink to enough customers so that they recouperate the cost involved in buying it in the first place (plus a margin for profit).

The number of customers that share the uplink is what is known as the uplink's contention ratio. For example, 20 customers on the one uplink is a 20:1 ratio. Most consumer internet service providers have contention ratios between 20:1 and 50:1.

The problem with a highly contested internet connection is simple - you're sharing the bandwidth with a lot of other people who are using your uplink. At peak times, a highly contested connection can slow to a crawl.

All Spiderbox data connections are at the low end of the contention ratio range at around 20:1 (Spiderbox Dedicated DSL is 1:1). You won't find many internet providers advertising their contention ratio because they want to keep it a secret from you. We're proud of ours because we've managed to keep it so incredibly low - which results in a far better experience for our customers.