Virgin Home Broadband Review

Virgin Broadband Review: Overview

When it comes to Home Broadband in the UK, Virgin are at the top of the tree, they have the fastest download speeds in the UK and even offer 30-day contracts.

In this Virgin broadband review, we give you all of the information you need to make an informed decision on whether this is the right provider for you.

Their packages are perfect for those who rely on fast speeds for working at home, or gamers that rely on a stable connection.

Virgin do not mess about, they don’t offer an ADSL package, meaning if you are even considering this option then you have a need for speed.

The standard length for Virgin contracts is only 12-months too, meaning you aren’t going to be stuck with them for 18-month or even 24-months.

There is one negative of the 12-month contract though; it does mean that you would need to pay a £25 setup fee.

Now, of course, all of their packages are unlimited, so you can download until your heart’s content, making it perfect for those that love to stream, watch YouTube videos and binge Netflix.

Other providers won’t come anywhere close to the speeds that Virgin Home Broadband offers, but speed isn’t everything for some customers.

Virgin also offer broadband-only deals meaning you won’t need to switch your home phone over to them if you don’t want too.

So how does Virgin home broadband fair up when it comes to customer service, reliability and setup speed?

Let’s find out…

Virgin Broadband Review: Packages

Virgin offer 4 different types of home broadband packages, they have something for everyone.

Whether you’re a casual user but prefer consistent and a stable connection, to heavily relying on broadband every single day for your income

Let’s take a look at the packages Virgin offer:

• Vivid 50 Fibre Broadband – 54MB (12-months)
• Vivid 100 Fibre Broadband – 108MB (12-months)
• Vivid 200 Fibre Broadband – 213MB (12-months)
• Vivid 350 Fibre Broadband – 362MB (12-months)

As you can see Virgins bottom end package starts at 54MB, giving you more than double the speed of what other providers basic packages offer.

This means that if you opt for any Virgin package, you will be getting a minimum speed of 54MB, which is rather strong.

That being said this does come at a cost, Virgin’s 50 Fibre package starts at £33 per month, when compared to the like of BT’s fibre, this is only £30.

One thing we did notice when reviewing Virgins Home Broadband, is that they almost always have a sale on, meaning if you’re lucky enough to see a package that you like on sale, you should jump at it.

The chance of you catching the same sale price again is rare, all packages do come with a £25 setup fee too, but we will get to that shortly.

Virgin Broadband Review: Coverage

The reason why Virgin home broadband has the fastest speeds in the UK is that they have their very own fibre infrastructure.

Companies like EE and Plusnet both run from a BT line, whereas some years ago Virgin decided to compete and install their own lines in many homes around the UK.

See Related:

*BT Broadband Review*
*Sky Broadband Review*
*TalkTalk Broadband Review*
*Plusnet Broadband Review*
*EE Broadband Review*

With Virgin now expanding their reach rapidly, over 60% of the country can now get Virgin Fibre broadband, great news for those that rely on fast speeds.

You can always check if Virgin is available in your area by using their AVAILABILITY CHECKER.

It is always best to check your postcode on the checker before signing up to anything be it over the phone or online because you will want to make sure that you are eligible for the plan that you are looking for first.

However, if they are not available in your area, you can always check out our EE and BT Home Broadband review as they have around 90-95% coverage in the UK.

Virgin Broadband Review: Performance

Like most Home Broadband providers, Virgin do offer home phone services, their plans come with inclusive calls on every plan, perfect for those who still love a good chat on their landline.

That being said Virgin do also offer broadband-only deals, so you are not forced to move your landline over if you do not want to.

They offer features like:

• Free Voicemail
• 1471 – Last Number Recall
• 141 – Number Withhold
• 1475 – Delete Last Incoming Number

Completely FREE on all of their packages, they also offer 5 home phone plans that give you a lot more flexibility with your home phone.

Let’s take a look at the home phone packages Virgin offer:

• Inclusive Weekend Calls – This involves calls to UK landlines, Virgin Mobile Numbers and 0870 numbers on a weekend only.
• More Inclusive Weekend Calls – This plan involves calls to UK landlines, Virgin Mobile numbers, 0870 numbers, all other UK Mobiles and 0845 numbers. Priced at £1 extra per month.
• Inclusive Evening and Weekend Calls – This plan included calls to UK landlines, Virgin Mobile numbers, 0870 numbers, 0845 numbers and all other UK mobiles. Priced at £5 per month.
• Inclusive Anytime Calls – This package allows you to call UK landlines, Virgin Mobile numbers, 0870 numbers, all other UK mobiles and 0845 numbers whenever you like. Priced at £8 per month.
• Talk More International Anytime – This package allows you to call UK landlines, Virgin Mobile numbers, 0870 numbers, 0845 numbers, all other UK mobiles and 50+ counties whenever you like. This package is priced at £15 per month.

As you can see Virgin offer a range of home phone services, ideal for those who still use their landlines.

The good thing is you can add or strip back these add-ons at any time, meaning you don’t need to see them through if you find you are not making use of them regularly.

Virgin Broadband Review: TV

Virgin do offer the option to add TV into their packages, they have either a 500TB Tivo Box or a V6 box powered by Tivo with their TV deals.

The Tivo V6 box is fantastic and comes 4K ready, allowing you to view your TV in Ultra-HD, which is up to 4x sharper than regular HD.

You can search for your favourite shows at the touch of a button, with apps loading extremely fast so you’re not waiting around to catch your favourite shows.

You can also stream anywhere that you have Wi-Fi, so if you’re somewhere that has 3G or 4K in the UK, you can stream your Virgin TV services.

The V6 box allows you to pause, rewind and record up to three channels at once, ensuring you never miss anything that you really want to watch.

The box is very intelligent too, it learns from your positive and negative ratings what to recommend to you, so it won’t show you things that it thinks you won’t want to see unless you search for them of course.

They have two different TV packages; they have the Mix-TV deal, which involves 150+ channels with 11 being in HD. It is a 12-month contract with a £25 upfront cost, priced at £26 per month.

Or they have the Full House TV package that is 230+ channels, 50 being in HD. Again this is a 12-month contract with a £25 set up fee, priced at £49 per month.

If you’re big into watching TV, then you may be able to grab yourself a bargain deal with the fastest broadband in the land, and an extremely competitive TV package too.

Let’s take a look at what each of their broadband packages offers…

Vivid 50 Fibre Broadband

So this package is Virgins smallest package, although its average speed is of 54MB/sec, giving you unlimited download speeds that are already rather fast.

This package may be the most basic, but it is certainly good enough for homes with 3 or 4 connected devices, if you have kids and they use games consoles, then this package would keep them online without interruption.

Priced at £35 per month, with a one-off setup off of £25, it doesn’t start at the cheapest cost of broadband we have ever seen.

However, with it being a 12-month contract rather than an 18 or 24-month, it gives you a little less time to be tied in.

The plan comes standard with inclusive weekend calls to selected numbers, as you can see in the above section too, so if you still enjoy your home phone then this could be a plan worth looking at.

We found that the only package we could compare this one too, is EE’s fibre deal, as EE also give you a 10GB data boost on your mobile phone, so if you are an EE customer you will want to check out our EE Home Broadband Review.

Vivid 100 Fibre Package

The Fibre 100 package gives users double the speeds of the previous deal; it offers an average speed of 108MB/sec.

All of Virgins broadband packages are very consistent when it comes to speed, we found that the speeds quoted were always on or above the speed that was quoted.

Again the usage here is unlimited, meaning you can download as much as you like without any interruptions or caps.

This package is priced at £40 per month with a setup fee of £25, again with a 12-month contract.

The reason Virgin offers such great speeds compared to other providers is because they use their own ‘DOCSIS 3’ cables, meaning they offer fibre into the property.

This gives the reliability and speeds you need all of the time, allowing you to stay connected with great speeds, every second of every day.

Virgin Fibre 200 Package

The Virgin Fibre 200 package offers users an average speed of 213MB/sec, this speed is very, very fast and almost anyone will be more than happy with this service.

This package is perfect for those who are gamers or they work from home, and demand a stable and reliable connection that can’t be slow with any latency.

The package is priced at £45 per month, which certainly isn’t cheap, but if you’re opting for Virgin broadband then you don’t want cheap, you want fast.

Again with a one-off £25 set up fee that ensures that your broadband is set up correctly and gets you the router delivered to you.

With a 12-month contract too, meaning your not locked in for 2 years if you do decide that it’s a little bit pricey and you don’t require the speeds that they are providing.

Virgin Fibre 300 Package

Last but certainly not least is Virgins Fibre 350 package; this is almost the pinnacle of what home broadband can be here in the UK.

Offering users an average speed of 362MB/sec, this is more than enough for anyone, we would be hard-pressed to find someone who says the actually need this amount of speed at home.

This package is priced at £50 with a setup fee of £25, of course with unlimited usage and a 12-month contract.

We did find in this Virgin broadband review that it is very unlikely that you will be able to have this package though, as coverage is a big issue for Virgin at the minute especially on this plan.

We tested 30 different postcodes throughout the UK and found that only 6 of them were able to have this package, so we recommend checking your postcode in the checker we have linked above to check if you are eligible.

This plan is a little over the top for most people, but again if you work from home or are a competitive gamer, then this could be the plan for you, that being if you have £50 to shell out every month.

Virgin Broadband Review: Router

Every single one of Virgins Home Broadband packages comes with their Virgin Media Super Hub, this bad boy is incredible.

This router is capable of more than 100MB, meaning its actually 7x as fast as the average router here in the UK.

The router is packed with all of the latest tech, it supports fast data transfers, real-time HD media streaming and gaming downloads.

The superhub also lets you connect more than 20 different devices, allowing you to play games, download files and stream music all at the same time at incredible speeds.

The Hub also features the latest security tech, meaning you are going to be protected from any unwanted intruders trying to connect to your broadband, whether that be hackers or the stingy neighbours next door trying to hitch a ride.

You can be sure to have a strong signal no matter what corners of the house you are into, thanks to its 5GHz compatibility, so ideal for those with loft conversions or basements.

Virgin Broadband Review: Data Caps

Paying this much for a broadband package you would, of course, expect everything to be unlimited, which is why Virgin offer truly unlimited, uncapped services.

Meaning can download until your heart desires, this is the same with most providers so it’s nothing out of the ordinary.

But it is nice to be able to download as many movies as you like without having to stress about usage.

That being said they do still traffic manage those customers who are uploading a lot, they also have a fair usage policy which you can check out on their website but for the most part this won’t affect the average user.

Virgin Broadband Review: Setup

As previously mentioned in the above sections, all of Virgin home broadband packages do come with a £25 set up fee.

They charge this to ensure that the router is shipped out to you if you don’t have a line already installed there is no line installation fee either.

Which is to be expected, as there is nothing you could do with a Virgin line apart from receiving Virgins broadband services.

Virgin handle every single aspect of switching from your current provider too, they are extremely quick at doing this and usually have you fully switched in 14 days.

You won’t even need to contact your current provider as Virgin do everything for you.

Virgin Broadband Review: Customer Service

So how good are Virgins customer services? They are pretty good and we found that they were delightful to speak with on the phone.

Virgins customer satisfaction score was 91% back in 2018, meaning the majority of customers were more than happy with the services they provide.

The average wait time to speak to a Virgin representative is 1 minute and 39 seconds, which isn’t too bad either.

We spoke to a lovely woman on the phone when gathering information for this review that was more than happy to help us with all our queries without pushing sales on us.

They also have an excellent live chat system which is perfect if you have any quick questions you need to ask, they connect you to an agent almost instantly.

Overall the customer services from Virgin is strong, they have 40/100K complaints which speaks for itself, and if you do happen to encounter any issues they are more than willing to guide you through step-by-step on the phone.

Virgin Broadband Review: Summary

So is Virgin Home Broadband worth the cash? Well if you have a need for speed and can’t accept anything but the best, then yes!

Virgin’s packages are excellent when it comes to speed and reliability, we found that even there most basic packages offers excellent speeds and connectivity.

We love the fact that they have one router too, so no matter if you regrade onto a higher package or lower package then you won’t need to be sent out a new router, unlike other providers.

We love that Virgin offer broadband-only deals, meaning you are not forced to move your landline over to them as this is simply not needed.

The problem with Virgin is the coverage, around 60% of the UK are eligible for their services which isn’t a lot, and if your hoping for a 350MB speed plan then you will be very lucky to be able to have one.

The setup fee isn’t going to break the bank either, it’s to be expected from a company like Virgin where they offer a very high tech router and lightning-fast speeds.

Customer service wise they are great, the speedy live chat system is great for quick queries and the customer service teams are super friendly on the phone too.

Virgin are at the pinnacle of what the UK has to offer when it comes to broadband, but we always recommend checking out our other Home Broadband Reviews in case another provider is more suited to your needs.

We hope you have enjoyed our Virgin broadband review and feel free to leave a comment as we are always looking for ways to improve our posts.

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