Pricing trends for communications services

Phones and broadband Bills and charges Research, statistics and data
Published: 23 January 2024

This report looks at pricing trends for UK residential fixed broadband, mobile phone, landline and pay-TV services.

It covers the prices at which standalone and bundled services are offered and what customers pay for these services. It also looks at affordability, debt and consumer engagement.

2023 report

Pricing trends for communications services in the UK (PDF, 3.4 MB)

Tueddiadau prisio ar gyfer gwasanaethau cyfathrebu yn y DU (PDF, 874.4 KB)

Pricing trends for communications services in the UK: interactive report

Previous years

An econometric analysis of pricing trends in the UK

In monitoring whether the mobile sector continues to deliver favourable outcomes for consumers choosing to move or adopt new tariff plans, there are contrasting views on recent UK mobile pricing trends. Assessing trends in mobile prices is a complex task because of the degree of differentiation in tariffs offered by mobile operators. Price differences between mobile operators or between different tariffs of the same operator may simply reflect differences in the tariff characteristics or handset.

This document sets out our analysis of mobile pricing trends in the UK for tariffs that were available between 2013 and 2017. Given the difficulties with directly comparing mobile contracts, we have undertaken an econometric approach which controls for the different elements of available tariffs, and their associated handsets. This allows us to identify underlying pricing trends for consumers choosing to move or adopt new tariff plans. It does not include tariffs which were removed from the market before this period (which consumers may have remained on).

An econometric analysis of pricing trends in the UK (PDF, 896.7 KB) 19 October 2018

Older research is available through the National Archives.

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