For most American households, being connected to the internet is as crucial as having electricity and running water. The challenge when comparing the best internet service providers (ISPs) in your area is to find one that meets your household’s needs.

If you want a ‘smart household’ with lots of interconnected devices, then you’ll need fiber internet with 1 gigabit (actually 940 Mbps) download capacity. If your requirements include massive downloads and streaming/gaming in 4K on multiple devices, then it makes sense to pay for high speeds of at least 100-400 Mbps. But if all you need is a reliable connection, then you may want to select a more affordable plan with speeds of 20-60 Mbps.

The other important thing to recognize is that internet services vary from area to area. According to the Federal Communications Commission, around one-third of Americans now have access to high-speed fiber broadband. But most rural areas and many urban and suburban areas are still limited to DSL, cable, or satellite. Therefore a useful starting point would be to search for ‘internet providers in my area’ or use this FCC search tool for a partial list of options where you live. 

To help you begin your search, we compiled this list of the 10 top internet providers in America. We assessed the internet-only plans from all the best ISPs and selected the best ones for speed, affordability, and so on. We hope this assists you in making an informed decision!

But when comparing VPN services, what are the most important factors one should look into? We’ve researched and compared a number of VPN providers according to the most essential factors, such as: privacy & security, speed, number of servers and locations, streaming and torrenting, supported software, and pricing plans.