BT Essentials Broadband

Vegastare

Mum is upgrading her TV and we are looking to paying for her to have broadband in the hope she can have a smart TV and access more channels and opportunity to catch up and download.  Several years back BT said the speed offered then would not be consistent with downloading as too slow and might take hours etc. Now it says 36Mbps - do you think this is ok for her use.
To add she is in her 80's has no laptop etc and is on the BT basic phone line ( falls into the pension credit cat) to enable family to contact her daily. The added cost is £15 per month.
Any advise please. It is pointless to get a smart TV if she can't use it.

littleboo

36Mbps is more than enough, the BBC suggests 24Mbps UHD/4K, 5 Mbps for HD

Neil_Jones

Vegastare said:

Mum is upgrading her TV and we are looking to paying for her to have broadband in the hope she can have a smart TV and access more channels and opportunity to catch up and download.  Several years back BT said the speed offered then would not be consistent with downloading as too slow and might take hours etc. Now it says 36Mbps - do you think this is ok for her use.
To add she is in her 80's has no laptop etc and is on the BT basic phone line ( falls into the pension credit cat) to enable family to contact her daily. The added cost is £15 per month.
Any advise please. It is pointless to get a smart TV if she can't use it.

You don't need broadband to have a Smart TV per se, but you will if you wanted to use things like Netflix, Prime and YouTube.  It will still work as a Freeview TV regardless.

36Mps is plenty.

Vegastare

Thanks for this - it points us in the right direction.