Upshur County is genuinely hard to serve. 26.9% of locations here have no fixed broadband at all, so for a lot of addresses the real choice is satellite or a cellular home-internet gateway, not a wired provider.
Everything below comes from the FCC's Broadband Data Collection, the filings providers are legally required to make about where they offer service. It describes the county; your own address can differ, and that is exactly why the technology mix matters.
Where Upshur County sits in West Virginia
Share of addresses with no fixed broadband at 25/3 Mbps
0.0% to 10%
10% to 12%
12% to 19%
19% to 27%
27% to 32%
32% to 49%
49% and above
not published
This county is outlined. Darker means a larger share of addresses with no fixed broadband. Select any county to open it.
What reaches homes in Upshur County
Locations covered by each technology, out of 12,337 broadband serviceable locations. An address can be reached by more than one technology, so these add up to more than 100%.
Fiber5,865 · 48%
Cable6,944 · 56%
Licensed fixed wireless2,751 · 22%
Unlicensed fixed wireless0 · 0.0%
DSL over copper0 · 0.0%
Served, underserved, unserved
The FCC's three categories. "Served" means at least 100/20 Mbps is available; "underserved" means at least 25/3 but below 100/20; "unserved" means below 25/3 or nothing at all.
Category
Locations
Share of county
Served
8,663
70.2%
Underserved
355
2.9%
Unserved
3,319
26.9%
What that means if you live here
The USDA classes Upshur County as a nonmetro county with an urban population of 5,000 to 20,000, not adjacent to a metro area (continuum code 7).
Population is around 23,791, which works out to about 1.9 people for every address on the list.
3,319 locations, 26.9%, or better than one address in five, have no fixed service reaching 25/3 Mbps. That is a large gap even by rural standards.
A further 2.9% of the county sits in the middle: served, but below the 100/20 Mbps mark.
The most widely available technology here is cable, reaching 6,944 locations (56.3%); next is fiber at 47.5%.
Fiber reaches 5,865 locations, 47.5% of the county.
Cable reaches 56.3% of locations, more than fiber does, and it will be concentrated in the built-up parts of the county.
11 providers file coverage in Upshur County: 3 with fiber, 1 with cable, 3 with licensed fixed wireless.
In twelve months fiber went from 5,231 locations to 5,865 here.
Served locations rose 4.21% year on year.
Upshur County is harder-served than the typical West Virginia county, where the median unserved share is 15.2%.
What people actually measure in West Virginia
Median of real speed tests run on each network during 2024, from M-Lab. This is measured performance, not an advertised plan speed, and not a customer review. The middle-half column shows how consistent a network is: a wide spread means your experience depends heavily on where and when.
Network
Median download
Middle half of tests
Median upload
Latency
Tests
Comcast Cable Communications
132 Mbps
52.1 Mbps to 315 Mbps
17.5 Mbps
20 ms
25,965
Optimum
113 Mbps
50.9 Mbps to 278 Mbps
17.6 Mbps
26 ms
24,131
Frontier Communications of America
18.2 Mbps
5.8 Mbps to 149 Mbps
1.7 Mbps
34 ms
22,815
Shenandoah Cable Television
93.1 Mbps
35.7 Mbps to 157 Mbps
10.4 Mbps
23 ms
4,138
Charter Communications
123 Mbps
50.4 Mbps to 262 Mbps
10.9 Mbps
33 ms
2,648
Community Antenna Service
128 Mbps
49.1 Mbps to 298 Mbps
34.0 Mbps
30 ms
1,946
CityNet
82.4 Mbps
36.1 Mbps to 147 Mbps
42.1 Mbps
25 ms
1,894
West Virginia Network for Educational Telecomputing
83.0 Mbps
30.0 Mbps to 195 Mbps
82.2 Mbps
30 ms
1,653
Hughes Network Systems
22.9 Mbps
7.3 Mbps to 41.4 Mbps
2.5 Mbps
65 ms
1,630
Armstrong
104 Mbps
55.8 Mbps to 223 Mbps
19.2 Mbps
32 ms
1,413
Latency is the number that decides whether video calls and gaming feel right, and it is where satellite differs most from everything else. Measured data is statewide: below county level there are usually too few tests to report an honest number.
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Your realistic options in Upshur County
Satellite
Starlink
Low-earth-orbit satellite. Latency is low enough for video calls and most gaming, unlike older satellite services.
Best for
Anywhere with a clear view of the sky and no wired option
Watch out
Hardware costs money up front, and heavy tree cover or a north-facing obstruction will cost you throughput