In Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) networks, fiber is installed all the way to the home of the customer. Indeed, fiber typically connects to a box on the outside wall of a home. In contrast, Fiber-to-the-Node (FTTN) networks terminate the fiber at the neighborhood cabinet. Therefore, optical nodes for FTTH networks have fiber connectivity, reducing the need for traditional amplifiers.
Given the proximity of fiber to the customer and better connection, Fiber-to-the-Home networks offer the fastest speeds. However, the drawback of FTTH networks is that they come at a higher cost to deploy for the telecom provider. Indeed, Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) speeds range from 100 megabits per second to 1 gigabit per second.
Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) presents the greatest competition to cable broadband services, which use hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) networks. However, given the significant cost to deploy a dense FTTH build-out, the scale of these services has limitations. Indeed, only ~1/3rd of total United States homes are economically viable for telecom providers to build Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) networks.
