Best Internet Providers in Asheville, North Carolina

What is the best internet provider in Asheville, North Carolina?

Nestled in the heart of North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains, Asheville, North Carolina is known for its breweries, artistic communities and scenic hikes. Perhaps less well-known, especially if you are new to the area, are Asheville’s best internet service providers. We’ll help get you acquainted.

CNET’s pick for the best internet provider in Asheville is AT&T Fiber. With an array of plans, symmetrical upload and download speeds and the fastest speeds in the city, AT&T is an obvious choice if your house is eligible for its fiber-optic plans.

However, since AT&T isn’t as widely available as other providers in the area, Spectrum may be your top choice for speed and reliability. Many residents of Asheville also have access to 5G home internet networks from providers like T-Mobile Home Internet or Verizon 5G Home Internet.

Either way, you’ll end up with a decent connection. According to the Federal Communications Commission’s availability map, 100% of households in the mountain city have access to a broadband connection with speeds of at least 100 megabits per second down and 20Mbps up.

If you’re looking for the most affordable internet prices, bundling an eligible phone plan with T-Mobile or Verizon’s 5G Home Internet may be your best bet, as the bundled rate for home internet is as low as $40 or $35, respectively. The fastest available internet speed in Asheville is currently AT&T, with their offering of 5,000Mbps. 

Source: CNET analysis of provider data.

Other available Asheville internet providers

AT&T Fiber and Spectrum Cable Internet are your best options for efficient broadband speeds at reasonable prices. However, residents can turn to fixed wireless providers or satellite internet if need be, hopefully only as a last resort. Here are your other internet provider options in Asheville:

• US Cellular: Like T-Mobile, this cellular provider offers fixed internet service that starts at $50 per month, and covers roughly 85% of households in Asheville. But while US Cellular doesn’t charge for exceeding a data threshold, the company will slow your speeds after you use your monthly allotment of 600GB.
• Carolina West Wireless: Another fixed wireless provider, Carolina West uses its (much smaller) cellular network to provide home internet to about 73% of households in the Asheville area. 
• Skyrunner: Available to more than 90% of Asheville residents, Skyrunner offers fixed wireless plans that are more expensive than T-Mobile’s. The company also charges hefty installation fees and imposes data caps on some service plans.
• Satellite internet: Satellite internet is typically a last resort. The drawbacks include lengthy contracts, slow speeds, high upfront costs for equipment, low data caps and high latency. Starlink, HughesNet and Viasat are the major satellite providers in the country.

Cheap internet options in Asheville

Spectrum’s 300Mpbs cable plan, at $50 per month, is slightly cheaper than the entry-level AT&T Fiber plan, which costs $55 per month. You can get an even cheaper monthly price if you bundle home internet service with an eligible cell phone plan with T-Mobile or Verizon.

Skyrunner, a local fixed wireless provider with select fiber options, offers a rate of $45 per month for their standard plan with download speeds of 6-10 Mbps. Although Skyrunner’s price may seem reasonable compared to the likes of AT&T and Spectrum, this standard tier comes out to around $4 per Mbps.

You’ll find better value and higher speeds from Spectrum’s introductory tier of 300Mbps at $50 per month, which comes out to 16 cents per Mbps. Keep in mind, though, that Spectrum’s introductory prices will increase by $30 after the first 12 months.

Source: CNET analysis of provider data.

How fast is Asheville broadband?

AT&T is the one provider that offers fiber to a significant percentage of households in the area. Spectrum’s cable service tops out at 940Mbps — not as fast as AT&T’s top-tier plans, but sufficient for most households. 

Source: CNET analysis of provider data.

What’s a good internet speed?

Most internet connection plans can now handle basic productivity and communication tasks. If you’re looking for an internet plan that can accommodate videoconferencing, streaming video or gaming, you’ll have a better experience with a more robust connection. Here’s an overview of the recommended minimum download speeds for various applications, according to the FCC. Note that these are only guidelines — and that internet speed, service and performance vary by connection type, provider and address.

For more information, refer to our guide on how much internet speed you really need.

• 0 to 5Mbps allows you to tackle the basics — browsing the internet, sending and receiving email, streaming low-quality video.
• 5 to 40Mbps gives you higher-quality video streaming and videoconferencing.
• 40 to 100Mbps should give one user sufficient bandwidth to satisfy the demands of modern telecommuting, video streaming and online gaming. 
• 100 to 500Mbps allows one to two users to simultaneously engage in high-bandwidth activities like videoconferencing, streaming and online gaming. 
• 500 to 1,000Mbps allows three or more users to engage in high-bandwidth activities at the same time.

How CNET chose the best internet providers in Asheville

Internet service providers are numerous and regional. Unlike the latest smartphone, laptop, router or kitchen tool, it’s impractical to personally test every ISP in a given city. So what’s our approach? For starters, we tap into a proprietary database of pricing, availability and speed information that draws from our own historical ISP data, partner data and mapping information from the Federal Communications Commission at FCC.gov. 

This guide leverages an in-house artificial intelligence tool called RAMP, which is trained on our own writing and uses our database to generate content about specific internet service providers that our writers can use in determining and presenting our picks for a given guide. Check CNET’s AI policy for more information about how our teams use (and don’t use) AI tools.

Because our database is not exhaustive, we go to the FCC’s website to check the primary data for ourselves and make sure we’re considering every ISP that provides service in an area. Plans and prices also vary by location, so we input local addresses on provider websites to find the specific options available to residents. To evaluate how happy customers are with an ISP’s service, we look at sources including the American Customer Satisfaction Index and J.D. Power. ISP plans and prices are subject to frequent changes; all information provided is accurate as of the time of our prepublication fact-check.

Once we have this localized information, we ask three main questions: 

1. Does the provider offer access to reasonably fast internet speeds? 
2. Do customers get decent value for what they’re paying? 
3. Are customers happy with their service? 

While the answer to those questions is often layered and complex, the providers who come closest to “yes” on all three are the ones we recommend. To explore our process in more depth, visit our how we test ISPs page.

What’s the final word on internet providers in Asheville?

Choosing an internet provider in Asheville is pretty straightforward: If your household is eligible for AT&T Fiber, that’s what you want. Its symmetrical 1Gbps service, at $80 per month, will strike the right balance between speed and price for most households. Otherwise, Spectrum’s cable internet service is the best alternative, with speeds up to 300 to 1Gbps starting at $50 to $80 per month.

Internet providers in Asheville FAQS