Ofcom regularly monitors people’s experience of communications services. This page sets out the findings from our latest research into the affordability of home broadband, mobile phone, landline and pay TV services.
*Base sizes too low to display demographic groups by month for ‘Where eligible respondents first heard of fixed broadband social tariffs’
*Base size too low to display ‘Where eligible respondents first heard of mobile social tariffs’
** Financial Vulnerability combines household income, working status and the size of the household and creates three distinct groups based on expected financial vulnerability. The Most Financially Vulnerable group are those who have a low household income relative to household size. For example, any household with an overall income under £10,400 or a household with at least 6 inhabitants and an overall income of £36,400 - £51,999 would both fall into this category.
Please note that not all those taking part in the survey answer the household income question. In October 2025, 36% either didn’t know or refused to answer the household income question.
Communications affordability tracker - technical annex
Communications affordability tracker - technical annex (October 2025) (PDF, 258 KB)
Download the data
The data used in these charts is available to download via our statistical release calendars.
Data from previous research
Communications Affordability Tracker: Data tables June - October 2021 (combined) (XLSX, 2.0 MB)
Communications Affordability Tracker: Data tables June - October 2021 (CSV, 2.9 MB)
Communications Affordability Tracker: Data tables June - October 2021 (SAV, 1.3 MB)
Communications Affordability Tracker: Codebook June - October 2021 (XLSX, 75.6 KB)
2021
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker: Codebook (XLSX, 89.5 KB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker: Data tables (XLSX, 2.5 MB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker: Data tables (PDF, 5.3 MB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker: SPSS (SAV, 2.8 MB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker: Questionnaire (PDF, 275.4 KB)
2020
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker data tables (XLSX, 2.4 MB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker codebook (XLSX, 32.0 KB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker respondent-level data (CSV, 12.8 MB)
Covid-19 Affordability Tracker respondent-level data (SAV, 2.2 MB)
2016
Affordability of Communications Services Tracker 2016 (PDF, 473.0 KB) Dec 2016
Affordability of Communications data tables including boost sample (PDF, 7.9 MB) Dec 2016
Affordability of Communications data tables nat rep sample (PDF, 7.7 MB) Dec 2016
Affordability Tracker 2016 data (CSV, 7.7 MB) Dec 2016
2015
Affordability of communications services omnibus (PDF, 289.9 KB) Nov 2015
Omnibus carried out by Kantar Media November 2015
Affordability of communications services - data tables (PDF, 1.8 MB) Nov 2015
Ofcom Communication Provider Mystery Shopping: affordability shops Jan 2015
2014
Affordability of essential communications services: a qualitative research study (PDF, 2.1 MB) Jul 2014
Criteria to define essential telecoms services - Literature review (PDF, 1.1 MB)
A report for Ofcom by The ESRC Centre for Competition Policy (CCP)
2013
Criteria to define essential telecoms services (literature review) (PDF, 1.1 MB) Nov 2013