20% Of American Internet Users Can’t Access HD Video

Sites include wistia.com . Published on September 14th, 2012. Written by Anthony West.

Americans are pioneers in many areas of technology and none so more than online video. YouTube after all, is a purely American creation.

It seems though, that despite this world-beating dominance of technology, some Americans don’t reap the benefits. A new study conducted by Wistia, a video hosting and analytics start-up has confirmed that 20% of Americans can’t access HD video. Now given that HD video is now almost a birth right, much like fast broadband, the news is particularly bad.

Wistia found that the majority of these people are unable to access any speeds greater than 2 Mbps on any device; so it’s not just people on mobile devices that are affected. Delving into the stats, Wistia found that some states are more likely to have access to HD video streaming.

North-eastern US states tended to have a better capability for accessing HD content while only 60% of the browsing population in states like Montana and Wyoming were able to access HD.

One would think that businesses would have HD capabilities, regardless of what everyone else was experiencing. But Wistia found that only 25% of users in the workplace were able to access HD video. The conclusion therefore being that it’s the ISPs that are somehow lacking in what they deliver.

HD video of course requires higher bandwidths and this may help explain why so many Americans are unable to access this type of video viewing experience.