This article was contributed to TechCabal by Conrad Onyango/bird
Algerians experienced the fastest growth in internet speeds over the past year, compared with anywhere else in the world, a Digital Quality of Life (DQL) index shows.
The North African country has been ranked first in both mobile and broadband speed growth by Surfshark, a provider of Virtual Private Networks (VPN) and other cybersecurity services in its 2021 global index.
Algeria was also among the best ranked (8th worldwide) on the mobile internet stability, even as the index placed it at position 86 in overall global digital quality of life ranking and 7th top African country in terms of digital services.
This indicates the country was the most aggressive in the world in terms of expanding its bandwidth to increase efficiency for its citizenry.
A comparative study by Internet testing, data, and analytics firm, Ookla shows Algeria had a mobile download speed of 17.3Megabytes per second with an upload speed of 10.1 Mbps while its fixed broadband download and upload speeds were 9.95Mbps and 1.53 Mbps in August.
Senegal and Cote D’Ivoire also recorded significant growth in broadband speed, ranking alongside Algeria in terms of speed, taking positions 9 and 10 in Africa in the overall rankings and positions 92 and 93 in global rankings respectively.
The DQL index measures digital services quality based on 5 criteria: internet quality, electronic infrastructure, internet affordability, electronic security, and electronic government. Morocco and Nigeria also recorded exceptional growth of broadband speed at positions 10 and 16 globally.
However, Nigeria (82) leads Morocco (84) in global rankings and enjoys the 5th position among Africa’s top countries with high-quality digital services, ahead of Morocco in position 6.
Across the world, the index points to the rise of more affordable internet this year, with people having to work 29 percent less (28 minutes) to afford mobile internet and 11 percent more (25 minutes) to afford broadband internet compared to last year.
“Investing into electronic infrastructure and electronic government contributes to people’s digital wellbeing the most,” according to the index.
Most African countries recorded their best rankings in the categories of internet quality and affordability with two countries- Kenya and Mauritius adding the artificial intelligence readiness Index on the list of best rank areas for Africa.
South Africa leads Africa in the overall ranking and is placed 68th globally out of 110 countries in digital quality services.
Mauritius (74), Kenya (79), Tunisia (80), and Ghana (89) ranked second third, fourth, and position eight respectively in the continent.
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