UK Leased Line Price Guide 2026: Real Costs by Region

What a Leased Line Actually Buys a UK Business

A leased line is not just 'faster broadband'. Provider pricing guides indicate that network reach, construction work, contract term and service specification are major price drivers. The bandwidth quoted is reserved for one site, not shared across a street cabinet or exchange area.

That single point explains almost every anomaly in the pricing data below. A 100Mbps circuit in a fibre-rich city postcode may cost less than a 1Gbps circuit at a nearby site requiring new duct work; actual differences depend on the provider’s survey and quote. This is why indicative published guides must be viewed region by region rather than as one national average — and why the quote-form sites currently ranking for this term avoid publishing numbers at all.

The 2026 UK Leased Line Price Guide by Speed

AMVIA's 2026 UK leased-line guide gives the clearest published floor: entry prices from £69/month for 100Mb, £129/month for 1Gb and £349/month for 10Gb, but only in well-served postcodes with existing network presence nearby. The other guides reviewed here generally publish higher figures once location, contract term, provider and service scope are specified.

Pulling the main published 2026 UK sources together by tier (noting these indicative published guides reflect differing contract terms and tax conventions):

• •100Mb: AMVIA advertises a £69/month best-served-postcode starting price, with regional table ranges of approximately £175–£234/month (London) to £220–£320+/month (rural); Connect2 £180–£235/month headline; CompareNet from £130/month; Business Broadband Hub £175–£312/month (annualised at £2,100–£3,700/year) or £245–£335/month across named cities on a 60-month term; Netify gives a combined BTnet benchmark of £250–£950/month ex VAT for services from 100Mb to 1Gb; it does not, in the cited figure, break that range down by speed.
• •1Gb: AMVIA advertises a £129/month best-served-postcode starting price, with regional table ranges of approximately £300–£450/month (London) to £400–£650/month (rural); Connect2 £299–£320/month headline; CompareNet £200–£350/month typical; Business Broadband Hub £300–£450/month (annualised at £3,600–£5,400/year) or £395–£565/month across named cities on a 60-month term; Netify's BTnet benchmark £250–£950/month ex VAT (same combined band).
• •10Gb: AMVIA advertises a £349/month best-served-postcode starting price, with regional table ranges of approximately £550–£850/month (London) to £800–£1,200+/month (rural); CompareNet from £650/month; Business Broadband Hub £1,500+/month across named cities; Netify's BTnet benchmark £1,800–£3,200/month ex VAT.

Regional Price Spread: London, Major Cities, Suburban and Rural

Across all bandwidth tiers, geography remains the single biggest driver of monthly rental. Dense commercial centres like London benefit from extensive existing duct infrastructure and aggressive carrier competition, keeping baseline costs lowest. In contrast, suburban districts and regional cities face steeper transport fees, while rural sites incur substantial monthly premiums—frequently £50 to £350 higher across all speeds—driven by longer backhaul runs to the nearest point of presence and a lack of competing unbundled networks.

Business Broadband Hub's 2026 pricing table gives a second, independent regional read using named cities rather than broad bands, on a 60-month contract term: 100Mbps at £245–£295/month in London, £265–£315 in Manchester, £275–£325 in Birmingham and £285–£335 in Bristol. Scaled up to 1Gbps, the same cities run £395–£495 (London), £425–£525 (Manchester), £445–£545 (Birmingham) and £465–£565 (Bristol), while 10Gbps sits at £1,500 or more across all four named cities — a flatter, higher-end benchmark than AMVIA's London figures for the same tier, because the two guides use different contract terms and coverage assumptions.

Beyond the Monthly Fee: A Worked 36-Month TCO Example

Published guides differ on tax treatment: Netify's BTnet benchmarks explicitly exclude VAT, whereas AMVIA, Connect2, CompareNet and Business Broadband Hub do not specify VAT status (business buyers should treat them as ex-VAT). Taking Connect2’s 1Gb headline rate of £299–£320/month ex-VAT as a benchmark, base rental totals £10,764 to £11,520 over a standard 36-month term before factoring in one-off or recurring extras.

Four cost layers sit on top of that base figure. Installation fees are often waived on 36- or 60-month contracts, but shorter terms incur upfront connection charges. Annual indexation clauses (CPI or RPI plus a contract margin) increase rental costs each year. Hardware add-ons—such as a managed router, secondary failover circuit or static IP blocks—add regular monthly fees. Finally, Excess Construction Charges (ECCs) apply wherever new physical fibre or civils are required to reach the premises, driving the higher prices seen in rural quotes.

The Hidden Costs Nobody Puts on the Landing Page

Excess Construction Charges (ECCs) are the biggest single wildcard. An ECC is a provider charge for additional construction needed to reach a site, such as new duct or fibre; wayleave requirements may create separate delays or charges, so ask for both to be itemised. No 2026 guide in this dataset publishes a standalone ECC fee, but the regional gap can reflect local network reach and construction requirements, including possible ECCs, as well as competition, service specification and contract terms. Asking a provider for a written ECC estimate, and whether it's capped or amortised into the monthly rent, is the single most useful question a buyer can ask before signing.

Bearer size is the second overlooked factor. Providers may deliver an ordered service over access equipment or a bearer with greater technical capacity; ask what is being installed and what upgrades are supported — for example, taking 1Gb service on a 10Gb-capable bearer. If the provider installs spare capacity and the equipment and contract support it, a larger bearer may permit a future upgrade without new civils; obtain written confirmation. It's worth asking every provider what bearer size they're actually installing, not just what speed they're activating.

Router and CPE choice, failover circuits and static IP blocks round out the picture. None of the guides in this dataset publish standalone prices for these extras, which is exactly why comparing two quotes at the 'same' speed and term can still mean comparing very different total packages — a business evaluating Cisco SmartNet alternative support for the CPE, or looking to finance network equipment rather than rent a managed router, should get each of these itemised separately rather than accept a single bundled monthly figure.

Comparing Published UK Price Guides: What 'From £X' Really Means

Setting the main published 2026 sources side by side shows how differently 'leased line cost' can be defined depending on term, coverage, and whether figures are headline entry rates or broad carrier benchmarks. These figures represent indicative published guides from UK providers and resellers (including AMVIA, Business Broadband Hub, Connect2, CompareNet and Netify/BTnet) observed across mid-to-late 2026 rather than a formal statistical index. They do not share a single sample weighting or normalisation methodology, and conflicting figures reflect differing underlying assumptions.

Crucially, published guides vary in their tax conventions and contract terms. For example, Netify's BTnet benchmarks explicitly quote figures exclusive of VAT (£250–£950/month for 100Mb–1Gb and £1,800–£3,200 for 10Gb), whereas reseller headline guides often do not specify VAT treatment. Similarly, Business Broadband Hub's figures reflect 60-month contracts, whereas other guides assume a standard 36-month term or omit contract duration entirely. Because displayed rates are not normalised for contract term, upfront installation, indexation clauses, CPE or VAT, buyers must treat published prices as indicative guides rather than directly comparable quotes until speed, term, location and tax basis are aligned.

Is a Leased Line Right for Your Business? Checklist and ROI

1Gb FTTP may be sufficient where contention, variable upload performance and the absence of a business-grade SLA are acceptable; leased line benefits become more important where guaranteed performance, resilience or symmetric capacity is business-critical. A leased line is often the stronger option when guaranteed performance, symmetric capacity and contractual uptime or repair commitments are business-critical, although resilient alternatives may also be suitable — a distinction worth working through properly using a guide that compare leased lines with FTTP against each other on those specific criteria, rather than on headline speed alone.

Before requesting quotes, a UK business should work through a concrete postcode-availability and quote-request checklist: verify postcode reach to establish whether a site survey is needed for Excess Construction Charges (ECCs) or wayleaves; distinguish ongoing monthly rental from one-off charges such as installation, civils and hardware; confirm the physical bearer size alongside the activated bandwidth; verify contract length (such as 36 versus 60 months) and whether installation is waived; establish the exact annual indexation formula (CPI, RPI or capped margins); and verify whether quotes are inclusive or exclusive of VAT and managed CPE.

The ROI case is simplest when framed against downtime, not against the monthly premium alone: a dedicated, uncontended circuit's value comes from avoided disruption and predictable performance for revenue-critical systems, and for multi-site businesses, that reliability case often pairs naturally with understand SD-WAN solutions for routing traffic across primary and backup circuits. Businesses building the finance case internally can pull further worked comparisons from ongoing IT cost and ROI analysis coverage.

Sources

Every figure in this article traces to the sources below.

• •AMVIA — 2026 UK leased-line entry pricing (£69/£129/£349 floors)
• •AMVIA — 2026 regional price guide (London/city/suburban/rural ranges)
• •Business Broadband Hub — 2026 pricing table and named-city examples
• •Connect2 — 2026 leased-line headline pricing
• •CompareNet — 2026 dedicated fibre leased-line pricing
• •Netify — 2026 BTnet leased-line cost benchmark
• •Ofcom — business connectivity market framing for leased lines