Nearly half the world's homes will be WiFi'd by 2016

According to Strategy Analytics, last year a surprising 439 million households worldwide had installed home Wi-Fi networks -  that's equivalent  to 25 per cent of all households worldwide. But that growth will continue, spurred on by faster WiFi technology, lower costs, more intelligent devices around the home (with which to connect) and slicker protocols to connect them with.

Strategy Analytics predicts that the total worldwide number of Wi-Fi households will reach nearly 800 million in 2016, a penetration rate of 42 per cent. 

 

Wi-Fi Household Penetration %						2011
South Korea						80.3%
United Kingdom						73.3%
Germany						71.7%
France						71.6%
Japan						68.4%
Canada						67.8%
Italy						61.8%
USA						61.0%
Spain						57.1%
Australia						53.8%
Czech Republic						31.6%
Mexico						31.5%
Poland						28.0%
Russia						22.9%
China						21.8%
Brazil						20.4%
India						2.5%

What's perhaps surprising is just how commonplace WiFi already is in many global markets, especially in Asia. That South Korea tops the chart is logical, given its lead in broadband, but consider China with its whopping 22 per cent penetration rate in 2011. China will be the main growth driver in the global Wi-Fi home market over the next five years, adding another 110 million Wi-Fi households by 2016, claims Strategy Analytics.