Here are the countries with the fastest average internet speeds

The internet is nothing short of essential for most of our daily lives. And when the internet is faster, most of society usually wins. Nobody wants to wait.

So who's winning? Well, as this chart from Statista shows, it's South Korea. According to the newest "State of the Internet" report from content delivery network Akamai, released last week, South Korea continues to have the highest average connection speed in the world, with its 26.3 Mbps average representing a 28% increase year-over-year (albeit a 2.5% decrease quarter-over-quarter).

The US, meanwhile, doesn't crack the top 10, falling behind the likes of Finland and Latvia. This comes shortly after an FCC report found that millions of Americans are still stuck with less-than-broadband speeds. America remains a big country with older infrastructure and not a ton of competition, even as services reliant on fast internet (4K video, etc.) continue to grow in popularity.

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It's not all bad, though. Akamai says the United States' 16.3 Mbps figure is a 6.8% increase over last quarter, while usage of the more advanced IPv6 protocol has gone up in the US by 13% over the same time frame. The latter puts the US fourth overall in that category. Its average connection speed also ranks well above the global average of 6.3 Mbps, which itself is a 21% year-over-year increase. 

Statista