Data & Mapping

Up to 1 million locations could still need broadband service, according to Brooke Donilon, chief of staff of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), as the government prepares to identify areas that may qualify for additional funding. NTIA is waiting for an updated Federal Communications Commission broadband coverage map before working with states to identify locations that remain unserved. “We're anticipating somewhere between 600,000 to a million.

The Commerce Department is hoping to make broadband coverage maps as accurate as possible before a new round of funding aimed at locations that previously fell through the cracks. Assistant Commerce Secretary Arielle Roth, head of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration, said that at the agency’s last convening of state broadband directors, officials were adamant about “the importance of getting this right.”

CostQuest Associates announced that it has been awarded a contract by the Federal Communications Commission to continue providing the Broadband Serviceable Location Fabric, the foundational dataset underpinning the Commission’s Broadband Data Collection program. CostQuest was awarded the contract on September 4, 2026, following a competitive procurement process. The award reaffirms the company’s role in providing location-level data that federal, state, and local policymakers rely on to improve broadband mapping and expand connectivity across the United States. 

The U.S. fiber broadband market is in the midst of a massive “land grab,” mirroring the consolidation seen in the early days of wireless and cable. This race is driven by the reality that most U.S. cities can only sustainably support one or two fiber providers—and that fiber is now viewed as a critical component of future telecommunications earnings and revenue growth, not to mention a pathway for advanced AI services. But how to assess the current state of the U.S. fiber marketplace? An analysis of Ookla Speedtest data from almost 1,700 fixed internet providers in the U.S.

Louisiana continues to reach significant milestones while expanding broadband access across the state, with new Federal Communications Commission data highlighting the state's continued progress in bringing reliable connectivity to all communities. The latest FCC Broadband Data Collection data, which reflects broadband availability as of December 2025, shows significant growth in Louisiana's broadband access over the past six months. During that timeframe, more than 52,000 homes and businesses gained access to broadband statewide.

There is a lot of talk about improving the Federal Communications Commission broadband maps. I published a blog a few weeks ago that described a bill passed by the Senate that would require a new review of the FCC broadband maps. The bill is labeled the Modernization, Accountability, and Planning for Broadband Funding Act. I’m all for changes that would create an accurate broadband map.

Illinois isn’t doing so great closing its digital divide, and perhaps that’s why people in the state are picking up Starlink broadband at a faster pace than other states. According to new research from Ookla, based on Ookla’s Speedtest data, rural broadband access expanded across the U.S. in the first half of 2026, with nearly every state narrowing the gap between broadband performance in cities compared to broadband performance in rural areas. When compared to the second half of 2025, every state—with the exceptions of California, Delaware, and Illinois—made progress.

America’s broadband providers invested $92.6 billion in U.S. communications infrastructure in 2025—up 3.4% from 2024 and the third-highest annual total since 2002. Cumulative investment now approaches $2.3 trillion since 1996 as consumer and business demand for faster, more sophisticated networks grows. In 2025, broadband providers pushed fiber deeper into more communities, expanding modern networks to meet demand that is growing in scale and changing in character. Average monthly broadband usage reached 767.4 gigabytes per subscriber by year’s end, up 9.9% from 2024.

I can think of only three sources of locations that the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program missed the first time around. One group of locations is those being turned back to State Broadband Offices when BEAD awardees decide not to accept a BEAD grant. The broadband offices have been trying to find other internet service providers to take these locations at the original award price. But I already know of several examples where there are no takers—at least at the dollar level of BEAD that was awarded after the Benefit of the Bargain round.

There has been continued debate about the best way to measure poverty in the United States since the first official U.S. poverty statistics were published in the mid-1960s. The U.S. Census Bureau releases two poverty measures each September. The first, called the official poverty measure, is based on cash resources. The second, the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), includes both cash and noncash benefits and subtracts necessary expenses (such as taxes and medical expenses). The official poverty measure has remained mostly unchanged since it was introduced in the mid-1960s.