CenturyLink vs. Metronet Internet Providers Compared

CenturyLink’s DSL internet has wide coverage but slower speeds

CenturyLink is a DSL internet provider owned by a parent company known as Lumen Technologies. Lumen is the seventh-largest ISP in the U.S., based on its combined internet service in both DSL and fiber. Lumen serves a total of about 3 million customers [1]. CenturyLink is the DSL brand owned by Lumen. The fiber brand of Lumen is now known as Quantum Fiber. This review will focus on the CenturyLink DSL half of the Lumen brand. We will cover Quantum Fiber in a separate review, because the two brands provide very different technologies. If your only available internet is CenturyLink, your DSL connection is likely to be slower than if you have cable or fiber. DSL speed can vary widely depending on your neighborhood and even on the wiring in your home. But CenturyLink, like most DSL companies, will charge you the same price for a slow 10 Mbps download speed as for 100 Mbps download speed. It’s luck of the draw, with no price break for slower service. DSL customers just aren’t getting the same kind of value that fiber customers are getting. And that’s one probable reason that Lumen separated its two brands. Now, it should be easy to tell what you’re getting – mostly.  CenturyLink is DSL, and Quantum Fiber is all-fiber. On websites that still mix the two names, though, the speeds of each plan will often be a giveaway. CenturyLink sold half of its DSL network to Brightspeed in 2022. CenturyLink now has a very unusual coverage footprint: think of it as the Western half of the United States, minus California, plus Florida.

CenturyLink DSL charges high prices for widely varying speeds

DSL is not one of the faster internet technologies on the market. Usually, DSL customers sign up for their plans because there is no cable or fiber internet in their areas. And that can be a valid choice if DSL will give you better performance than satellite internet, though you have to evaluate that on a case-by-case basis. Many times, DSL plans are good options for customers in rural areas. CenturyLink plans are no exception to the general qualities of DSL. You will generally pay around $50 for your DSL package, whether you get 10 Mbps download speed or whether you are lucky enough to get 100 Mbps download speed (very unusual for DSL and true for only 28% of CenturyLink DSL customers) [2]. In better news, CenturyLink’s DSL plans are free of data caps. So, despite the fact that CenturyLink’s DSL prices are high for the speeds, at least you won’t have unexpected data overage charges.

Metronet’s prices start good and stay fair, but there’s a hidden fee

Metronet offers very attractive promotional pricing on the low end of industry rates. Their first-tier plan is only $34.95/month for the first year, a good 20% lower than some competitors. True, the plan’s speed is slower at 150 Mbps than some rival plans. But with fiber’s symmetrical download and upload speeds, you’re already going to have a lot more speed even than you’ll get from many cable or DSL providers. Two or three other national fiber internet providers offer promotional prices this good. The difference is that Metronet will not raise its prices dramatically when the first year is over. Metronet’s prices will rise only about $10/month at the 12-month mark. There’s just one catch. Unlike many of the other ISPs, Metronet does not offer free tech support. In order to get tech support, you will have to pay $12/month for their program called TechAssure. The fee is not optional. The positive is that all of your technical needs will be taken care of. You will get full service, including any house calls or equipment repair. The negative? Adding $12 to your monthly bill wipes out some of the benefit from Metronet’s low pricing. In Metronet’s favor, the tech support fee will be the only unusual fee on your monthly bill. Because Metronet has no data caps or contracts, you won’t get any surprise overage charges or an early termination fee if you have to cancel your service.

“But it was so fast in the ‘90s!” DSL shows its age in many locations

CenturyLink DSL uses one of the oldest internet technologies: copper cables originally designed as telephone wire. Only 65% of CenturyLink’s DSL achieves speeds over 25 Mbps, or what the FCC calls “high-speed” internet.  85% of the CenturyLink DSL network is above 10 Mbps. That means a good 15% of CenturyLink’s DSL customers have very slow connections below 10 Mbps [3]. If DSL gives you under 10 Mbps download speed and only 1 Mbps upload speed, you won’t be able to play real-time games online with any kind of reliability. You may also experience glitching if multiple people stream or videoconference at the same time. To be fair, some DSL connections will give you faster speeds. 28% of CenturyLink customers will get 100 Mbps download, and that speed will considerably improve your performance. But if you are considering ordering CenturyLink DSL, make sure you know what your other options are. You can test your actual speed here to see what kind of performance your current internet connection is giving you.

It’s all-fiber for the win with Metronet

There’s no getting past the fact that an all-fiber connection will give you much more speed and reliability than a cable or DSL internet connection. One of the great advantages of Metronet is that they deliver all-fiber service, every time. The fiber will run from their main network to the wall of your home. You will get symmetrical speeds, so your download and upload speeds will be the same. For any activities involving streaming, real-time gaming, and large file uploads, fiber is unbeatable. Fiber offers even more speed and bandwidth for the future. As technology continues to advance with developments such as Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR), we will begin to need the kind of bandwidth that only fiber offers. Some fiber providers are already beginning to provide 8 Gigs and 10 gigs for residential customers. Though Metronet still tops out at 5000 Mbps, their all-fiber connection will be able to meet your future speed needs. Fiber has some other benefits too. Fiber connections don’t weaken or slow in bad weather the way satellite or fixed-wireless connections do. And fiber connections are much harder to hack into or tap than a copper cable.

Option to use your own modem/router or self-install your connection

With the CenturyLink DSL plan, there’s a $15 a month modem/router rental fee, which is on the high end of equipment fees. You can avoid the modem/router fee by buying your own. And that might not be a bad plan, given that you will make up the price of a typical modem/router in a year or less. You may have to pay for a professional installation, which is usually a one-time fee of $99. Fortunately, in many places you may also have the option to self-install for $15. It depends whether there is still a working CenturyLink DSL connection in your home.

No equipment rental fees, low-cost installation with Metronet plans

For all plans up to 2 Gigs, Metronet will provide you with an eero wireless router at no charge [3]. If you are lucky enough to be able to get a 3-5 Gig plan, you will have to provide your own router to handle that level of speed. Metronet suggests a 10GB WAN/LAN compatible router such as the TP Link Archer AXE3000 [4]. Standard installation will only cost you $25 when you order a Metronet fiber internet plan. While this isn’t as good as free installation, it’s a lot cheaper than the usual $99 fee you’ll pay for installation from many ISPs.

CenturyLink runs below average in some satisfaction rankings

CenturyLink’s customer satisfaction rankings vary widely by region on the J.D. Power survey [3]. In the North Central region, CenturyLink ranks above average. In the West, CenturyLink ranks slightly below average, and in the South, CenturyLink is second from last in customer satisfaction. The North Central and West regions where CenturyLink/Quantum Fiber rank higher are also the regions in which Quantum Fiber provides most of its fiber access. The South only includes one state with fiber internet coverage, which means most of that low customer satisfaction rating is based on CenturyLink’s DSL. The American Customer Satisfaction Index confirms that split in results by dividing “CenturyLink” specifically into fiber and DSL. Fiber ranks 16 points higher than the DSL service [4]. For CenturyLink and Quantum Fiber, these customer satisfaction rankings tell the story clearly. CenturyLink’s DSL service is not as likely to please you. However, be aware that there is a certain amount of online cross-marketing between the two companies. So, if CenturyLink says they are able to sell you “fiber” as they seem to imply on their homepage, all that means is that they’re going to send you to a Quantum Fiber plan if your address has fiber availability.

Metronet customers are usually happy with their internet service

Metronet is another ISP that is too small to qualify for major national surveys of customer satisfaction. That means that estimating customer satisfaction is more an art than an exact science – or at least more qualitative than quantitative. The good news is that on the whole, online user reviews for Metronet are much more positive than for ISP competitors who offer cable or DSL service. You don’t see some of the angry rants online about Metronet that you will unfortunately see for cable internet and DSL internet. That’s not to say that cable and DSL providers don’t frequently provide good service, because they do. It’s just statistically more likely that you will see customer rants thrown in the mix. That’s the advantage of all-fiber internet that Metronet is reaping. Again and again, companies that move toward fiber service seem to have happier customers because the networks are newer and the technology is more reliable [5]. And for that reason, we’re going to award 4 stars to Metronet’s customer satisfaction.