Researchers in Japan have created a new type of fiber optic cable and set a new internet speed record of over 1.2 million Gbps. That’s nearly four million times faster than the average internet connection in the United States and would allow you to download the entire Internet archive in less than four minutes.
Researchers in Japan have created a new type of fiber optic cable and set a new internet speed record of over 1.2 million Gbps. That’s nearly four million times faster than the average internet connection in the United States and would allow you to download the entire Internet archive in less than four minutes.
A team of Japanese scientists from the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) has achieved a record data transfer speed of 125,000 GB/s (1.2 million Gbps), Live Science reports. The results were presented on April 3 at the 48th Fiber Optics Conference in San Francisco.
To do this, the team used a new development, an optical cable with 19 independent fibers compressed to a diameter of just 0.127 mm, the same as a conventional single-fiber cable. Thanks to this, the new technology can transmit data over existing infrastructure without requiring a radical replacement of networks.
The information passed through the communication system 21 times in a row, covering a total distance of 1,802 km (the equivalent of New York to Florida) before reaching the receiver. The main difficulties are signal loss over long distances and the need to amplify it. The team was able to overcome this by optimizing the interaction of light at the center of each fiber.
The new fiber minimizes data loss: all 19 channels have the same optical properties and operate synchronously. This makes the new technology suitable for scalable, long-distance communication systems that can meet the growing demand for global data traffic.
For comparison, the previous record, set in 2024, was 50,250 Gbps, which is almost half as much. And although the new data has not yet been independently verified, the demonstration was an important milestone on the path to next-generation ultra-high-speed optical networks.
In March 2023, the same team achieved similar speeds, but only for a third of the distance. The new development proves that the obstacles to long-term light transmission are gradually being overcome.
The Japanese scientists plan to continue working on practical applications of the technology in the telecom sector. According to forecasts, the global volume of transmitted data will grow exponentially in the coming years, so the need for such solutions will only increase.
Recall, we also wrote about how Kyivstar CEO Oleksandr Komarov announced that Ukraine would become the first European country with access to Starlink satellite Internet on phones.
