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When Will Google Fiber Be Available in Your City?

Google Fiber offers one of the fastest and most highly rated internet connections in the country, but its availability is limited to a handful of cities. Fortunately, Google Fiber has begun to expand its footprint by adding new cities to its network.

Want to see if Google Fiber is available in your area? Enter your zip code below.

Upcoming Google Fiber cities

CityTime frame
Taylorsville, Utah20232
South Salt Lake, Utah20235
Holladay, Utah20232
Woods Cross, Utah20232
Draper, Utah20234
Lakewood, Colorado202318
Omaha, Nebraska202319
White City, UtahTBA16
Springville, UtahTBA16
West Bountiful, UtahTBA16
West Jordan, UtahTBA16
Smyrna, TennesseeTBA17
Westminster, Colorado202421
Chandler, Arizona202421
Kearns, UtahTBA22
Hillsborough, North CarolinaTBA23
Pocatello, Idaho202424
Logan, Utah202425
Wheat Ridge, Colorado202426
Murfreesboro, Tennessee202427
Tega Cay, South Carolina202428
Bellevue, Nebraska202429
Queen Creek, Arizona202530

Many of the areas where Google Fiber is expanding are near existing Google Fiber cities. For example, Google Fiber has been slowly expanding in Salt Lake City, Utah, for several years. Now it’s extending its network into many of the neighboring cities in the Salt Lake Valley.

Although the list of currently announced new cities is still relatively short, Google Fiber is also expanding its network within current Google Fiber cities. For example, in early 2021, Google Fiber expanded into four more neighborhoods in Austin, Texas: Allandale, North Loop, Mueller, and North Shoal Creek. As it expands its network in Austin, Google Fiber plans to add more neighborhoods in the near future.6

Google has also expanded into several new neighborhoods in the Raleigh-Durham area, with new coverage areas in the cities of Chapel Hill and Carrboro.7 If you live in or near an existing Google Fiber city, your odds are better than most for getting Google Fiber in your neighborhood.

Current Google Fiber cities

  • Atlanta, Georgia
  • Austin, Texas
  • Carrboro, North Carolina
  • Chapel Hill, North Carolina
  • Charlotte, North Carolina
  • Chicago, Illinois
  • Denver, Colorado
  • Des Moines, Iowa
  • Huntsville, Alabama
  • Irvine, California
  • Kansas City, Missouri
  • Kansas City, Kansas
  • Mesa, Arizona
  • Miami, Florida
  • Millcreek, Utah
  • Nashville, Tennessee
  • North Salt Lake, Utah
  • Oakland, California
  • Huntington Beach, California
  • Provo, Utah
  • Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina
  • Riverton, Utah
  • Salt Lake City, Utah
  • San Antonio, Texas
  • San Diego, California
  • Sandy, Utah
  • San Francisco, California
  • Seattle, Washington

Google Fiber began with a single city in 2010 and quickly expanded to a handful of cities across the country. At the time of its announcement, 1 Gbps (1,000 Mbps) was about 100 times faster than the average residential internet speed.8 And it wasn’t targeted at huge tech hubs like Silicon Valley and Seattle, but at suburban cities like Kansas City, Missouri, and Provo, Utah.

The massive hype surrounding these early Google Fiber cities not only pushed other cities to compete for Google’s attention but also made customers start demanding more from their internet service providers (ISPs). Over the next few years, fiber-optic connections went from being almost unheard-of in residential internet to being the gold standard of internet connections against which all other connection types are judged.

PlanPriceDownload speedGet it
Google Fiber 1 Gig$70.00/mo.*1 Gbps (1,000 Mbps)
Google Fiber 2 Gig$100.00/mo.*2 Gbps (2,000 Mbps)
Google Fiber 5 Gig$125.00/mo.**5 Gbps (5,000 Mbps)
Google Fiber 8 Gig$150.00/mo.**8 Gbps (8,000 Mbps)

Google hits pause

Despite the popularity of Google Fiber and the overwhelming number of cities lining up to become the next fiber city (Google expected between 10 and 50 applications and ended up with over 1,000), the project was put on hold a few years later.8

In Louisville, Kentucky, AT&T filed lawsuits against the local city and county governments to prevent Google Fiber from using utility poles, thus slowing down the network’s deployment. These lawsuits halted Google Fiber’s expansion and kept eager potential customers waiting for years for fiber to get to their neighborhood. Although a judge later dismissed the lawsuits as frivolous, the project was severely derailed.9

During this time, Google Fiber experimented with ”microtrenching,” an installation method where, instead of digging a deep, foot-wide trench, a crew could simply carve a narrow groove into a road, only slightly wider than the cable and a few inches deep.

Unfortunately, the experiment in Louisville went poorly, and many fiber-optic cables became damaged or even popped out of the road, tripping pedestrians.10 Google had to pay to repair the roads damaged during the failed installation and eventually pulled out of Louisville altogether.

At this point, the company had announced that Google Fiber was pausing all fiber-optic projects. Not only were potential expansions into new cities canceled, but mentions of network expansion in existing Google Fiber cities also disappeared from the provider’s website.11 For a time, this looked like the end of Google Fiber.

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Google Fiber today

After a long silence, Google Fiber announced its first new city in four years: West Des Moines, Iowa.12 Shortly after that, it announced several new cities around Salt Lake City, Utah.2, 3, 4, 5 Although this expansion is not quite as aggressive as its initial campaign, it seems likely that Google Fiber will continue to expand into new areas.

Despite the numerous setbacks that it encountered in places like Louisville, Google Fiber is continuing to explore new and innovative ways of delivering fiber-to-the-home technology. For example, despite its previous failure with microtrenching, Google Fiber is once again using this technique in places like Taylorsville, Utah.3

Google Fiber is also engaging in more public-private partnerships in order to expand its fiber network. It previously made similar deals with cities like Provo, Utah, which sold its municipal fiber infrastructure to Google.13 In West Des Moines, the city is building an “open conduit” that can be leased out to providers like Google Fiber.14 Many other countries handle internet infrastructure like this, and it can help increase competition among ISPs while reducing costs to customers.

How to get Google Fiber in your area

Google Fiber is still a relatively small ISP compared to companies like AT&T and Xfinity, so if it’s not in your city yet, you probably have a long wait ahead of you. In the meantime, there are some things that you can do to encourage Google Fiber and other fiber providers to expand into your area.

The most direct thing you can do is encourage change on a local level. Go to town council meetings. Talk to your state representatives. When state and local governments invest in municipal internet infrastructure and open networks, it can lower the barrier for smaller ISPs like Google Fiber to enter the area, improving speeds and increasing competition. Similar initiatives have been announced in places like New York City in order to bring universal broadband to all its residents.15

If nothing else, demand more from your internet. When Google Fiber was first announced, no one thought residential customers would want gigabit internet speeds. Now, demand for video chat, streaming services, and other media have made slower connections almost obsolete. If there’s enough demand for high-speed internet, some company will try to get it to you.

Google Fiber Webpass

Google Fiber Webpass (formerly known as Google Webpass) is a service that provides fixed wireless internet for high-occupancy buildings, such as apartments and office buildings. Unlike most providers, Google Fiber Webpass doesn’t offer service to individual households, but rather to landlords, who then wire the whole building and give tenants the option to use the built-in internet service.

Somewhat confusingly, Google Fiber Webpass is not a fiber connection, and it is not available in Google Fiber Cities. The name is simply for branding purposes—the two services are completely distinct.

Most widely available fiber providers

ProviderPriceDownload speedsGet it
AT&T$55.00/mo.–$180.00/mo.300 Mbps–5 Gbps (5,000 Mbps)
CenturyLink$30.00/mo.–$70.00/mo.200 Mbps–940 Mbps
EarthLink$59.95/mo.–$189.95/mo.100 Mbps–5 Gbps (5,000 Mbps)
Frontier$44.99/mo.–$154.99/mo.500 Mbps–5 Gbps (5,000 Mbps)
Windstream$39.99/mo.–$169.99/mo.500 Mpbs– 2 Gbps (2,000 Mbps)
Verizon$24.99/mo.–$94.99/mo.300 Mbps–2,300 Mbps

If Google Fiber isn’t available in your area yet, there might be another provider in your area offering fiber internet plans. Many nationwide ISPs are rolling out fiber-to-the-home connections to meet customer demands, and many of them have a much bigger fiber network than Google Fiber. The big difference is that none of these providers have a 100% fiber network like Google Fiber, so just because a provider covers your area, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they offer fiber at your address.

Is Google Fiber not in your city yet? Enter your zip code below to see other high-speed internet options.

Sources

  1. Google Fiber Blog, “Moving forward in West Des Moines,” January 19, 2022. Accessed February 23, 2022.
  2. Google Fiber Blog, “One Hot Summer in the Salt Lake Valley,” July 14, 2020. Accessed July 14, 2021.
  3. Addy Bink, ABC4.com, “Google Fiber Coming to Another Utah City,” April 22, 2021. Accessed July 14, 2021.
  4. Utah Business, “Google Fiber Draper Expansion Announced,” February 8, 2022. Accessed February 23, 2022.
  5. Ryan Bittan, ABC4.com, “Google Fiber Coming to Riverton,” December 15, 2021. Accessed February 23, 2022.
  6. Google Fiber Blog, “City Update: Google Fiber Is on the Move in Austin,” March 15, 2021. Accessed July 15, 2021.
  7. Jason Parker, WRAL TechWire, “Google Fiber Expanding in Triangle, Charlotte after 32% Increase in Bandwidth Demand,” May 4, 2021. Accessed July 15, 2021.
  8. Blair Levin and Larry Downes, Harvard Business Review, “Why Google Fiber Is High-Speed Internet’s Most Successful Failure,” September 7, 2018. Accessed July 15, 2021.
  9. Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica, “AT&T Admits Defeat in Lawsuit It Filed to Stall Google Fiber,” November 1, 2017. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  10. Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica. “Google Fiber’s Biggest Failure: ISP Will Turn Service Off in Louisville,” February 8, 2019. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  11. David Anders, CNET, “Whatever Happened to Google Fiber?” March 5, 2021. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  12. Google Fiber Blog, “Thank You, West Des Moines!” July 7, 2020. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  13. Dave Smith, International Business Times. “Google Fiber In Utah: Why Provo Sold Its $39 Million Internet Service to Google for Just $1,” April 19, 2013. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  14. Ryan Daws, Telecoms Tech, “Remember Google Fiber? It’s Just Expanded for the First Time in Four Years,” July 7, 2020. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  15. Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica, “NYC Broadband Plan Calls for Fiber Everywhere, with ISPs Sharing Network,” August 1, 2020. Accessed July 16, 2021.
  16. Ashley Church, Google Fiber Blog, “Things to watch on the Wasatch Front,” March 22, 2022. Accessed July 8, 2022.
  17. Ryun Jackson, Google Fiber Blog, “Big News in Tennessee!” June 21, 2022. Accessed July 8, 2022.
  18. Sasha Petrovic, Google Fiber Blog, “Rocky Mountain High,” November 1, 2022. Accessed November 22, 2022.
  19. Rachel Merlo, Google Fiber Blog, “Omaha! Omaha!” September 28, 2022. Accessed November 22, 2022.
  20. Nienke Onneweer, ABC15.com, “Smart city: Google Fiber, Three Others Approved by Mesa for High-Speed Internet Service,” July 14, 2022. Accessed November 22, 2022.
  21. Sasha Petrovic, Google Fiber Blog, “Google Fiber continues to grow – Next Up: Westminster, Colorado, and Chandler, Arizona!” February 10, 2023. Accessed March 20, 2023.
  22. Vivian Chow, ABC4.com, “Google Fiber expanding to another Utah city,” April 18, 2022. Accessed March 20, 2023.
  23. Town of Hillsborough, “Gigabit Fiber Is Coming to Hillsborough” March 10, 2023. Accessed March 21, 2023.
  24. Silvia Castro, Google Fiber Blog, “Our first city in Idaho – Pocatello,” April 20, 2023. Accessed May 10, 2023.
  25. Silvia Castro, Google Fiber Blog, “Logan, UT, coming online! ,” May 15, 2023. Accessed July 5, 2023.
  26. Sasha Petrovic, Google Fiber Blog, “Google Fiber is expanding to another Colorado city — Wheat Ridge,” August 29, 2023. Accessed September 21, 2023.
  27. Ryun Jackson, Google Fiber Blog, “Google Fiber expands to Murfreesboro, Tennessee,” August 31, 2023. Accessed September 21, 2023.
  28. Jess George, Google Fiber Blog, “Google Fiber is busy in North – and now South – Carolina!“, October 18, 2023 . Accessed November 2, 2023.
  29. Andy Simpson, Google Fiber Blog, “Getting to work in Bellevue, Nebraska,” November 10, 2023. Accessed December 21, 2023.
  30. Kelly Mixer, Queen Creek Sun Times, “Google Fiber coming to Queen Creek,” December 17, 2023. Accessed December 21, 2023.

Author -

Peter Christiansen writes about satellite internet, rural connectivity, livestreaming, and parental controls for HighSpeedInternet.com. Peter holds a PhD in communication from the University of Utah and has been working in tech for over 15 years as a computer programmer, game developer, filmmaker, and writer. His writing has been praised by outlets like Wired, Digital Humanities Now, and the New Statesman.

Editor - Rebecca Lee Armstrong

Rebecca Lee Armstrong has more than six years of experience writing about tech and the internet, with a specialty in hands-on testing. She started writing tech product and service reviews while finishing her BFA in creative writing at the University of Evansville and has found her niche writing about home networking, routers, and internet access at HighSpeedInternet.com. Her work has also been featured on Top Ten Reviews, MacSources, Windows Central, Android Central, Best Company, TechnoFAQ, and iMore.

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