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BUSINESS INSIGHTS
Business vs. Residential Internet: What's the Difference?
3:00 Minute Read
3:00 Minute Read
by Karen Kroll
With so many people now working from home, internet speed and reliability have become more critical than ever. As a business owner, you may wonder whether it’s worth getting business internet at your home—and encouraging your home-based employees to do the same.
To help you make the decision, it’s important to understand the key differences between business and residential internet. Here are five:
Depending on your internet service provider, residential plans can be offered at much slower download speeds than what you’d find with a business internet plan. “Typically business-grade service is a bit more robust across the board,” says Jason Harrison, president of Harrison Technology Consulting in Rocky Mount, North Carolina.
Keep in mind that some of your remote employees may have a residential internet plan with a much lower speed than what they’d get at the office. Many people have slower internet at home because they didn’t need very high-speed internet before the pandemic started. But now that they work from home, their residential internet may be insufficient—slowing them down and reducing their productivity. Moreover, other members of their household may be relying on the same lower-speed connection for other online activities, whether watching movies, distance learning or doing their own job.
Residential internet plans often come with “extras” specifically geared for personal use, such as streaming TV on smart devices. Business internet plans, on the other hand, offer features designed for the needs of businesses and their employees. Spectrum Business Internet, for example, provides up to 25 email addresses with your customer domain name, domain-name registration and a free award-winning desktop security suite for up to 25 business devices.
Business internet plans offer features designed for the needs of business owners and their employees.
Business internet may offer a greater level of network reliability to customers than what is typically provided with residential internet. But with a business internet plan, there can be additional opportunities to bolster business continuity planning. Spectrum Business Internet, for example, has over 99.9% network reliability, but customers can add Wireless Internet Backup to prevent a power outage from disrupting their operations and productivity.
Many residential internet plans use dynamic internet protocol (IP). That is, the IP address through which the plans connect to the internet can change randomly.
In contrast, business internet packages that include static IP
assigned by the internet provider allow your system’s “street address” on the internet to remain the same, Harrison says. This can be key for several functions, including remote-access tools that allow employees to connect from their homes or while on the road—as they can rely on a consistent IP address.
The technical support teams assigned to business internet customers are often “better at addressing the more common issues businesses face,” Harrison says. Business support teams also tend to be more adept at handling the more complicated technical configurations some businesses require, he adds.
Thankfully, adding a business internet connection to a home is easy. If you or your employees are working from home on a rather consistent basis, you will probably discover significant benefits to them using business internet to do so.
CALL TO ACTION:
Spectrum Business can help you determine whether adding a business internet connection to your home is right for your company’s needs. Contact us at 855-299-9353.