Does anyone use dial up anymore

He found that even accessing social media platforms like Facebook was impossible at this speed. After spending 20 minutes attempting to play a YouTube video, he reported that the webpage stopped trying to load entirely.

One advantage of a dial-up internet plan is its incredibly low price. Many providers are willing to give you your first month free of charge, and Juno will even let you browse for 10 hours each month without paying anything at all. Dial-up internet is for users who never stream video or play games online, and who do very little to no photo sharing via social media sites and email. Dial-up internet is great for those who are overwhelmed by the complexity of modern high-speed internet plans and just want a simple way to check their emails once a day.

Still, thousands of Americans are still clinging onto dial-up, even as the rest of the country begins to embrace the next wave in internet technology: fiber-optic service. What is Dial-Up Internet? Close Modal. Unlike other internet types, like cable , DSL, and fiber , dial-up internet usually does not have data caps. However, your ISP may limit how many hours each month you can access your internet, often to ensure that others who also use dial-up in your area can connect when they need to, too.

If you like to read the news online, stay in contact through email, and do some light research on the web, a dial-up internet connection may serve you well. If you plan to play games, watch videos, or take advantage of your streaming TV and movie networks, your dial-up connection is likely to let you down.

Your ISP should give you the modem and all the information you need to connect, including your username, password, and the phone number to dial for your connection.

Connect your telephone line to your modem before trying to connect. Some ISPs provide you with a program to download to your computer to help you connect to the internet.

You can install this program and double-click it each time you want to connect. Back in , AOL was still beaming with 5. In , that number got slashed nearly in half, with 2. In , Statista showed a decrease to 1. Dial-up is certainly phasing out since the introduction of high-speed options to residents across the nation. Is dial-up right for you? However, if you need to use the web more frequently than a few minutes each day or for more than just email and light browsing, a high-speed internet connection will probably serve you better.

Sometimes I would make slight adjustments to settings that seemed relevant, like the access number I was using. Eventually, it worked. Not off the back of some Eureka moment, just as the result of dogged persistence. I consider myself to be proficient with computers, and technology in general.

When I was unable to connect, I assumed that I had done something wrong, and set about trying to fix the problem. The whole experience reminded me of the temperamental internet that I used daily when I was younger.

You can imagine my excitement when, after many attempts, I was finally given access to the promised land of dial-up internet. I was ready to run speed tests on the likes of Google, Facebook, and Digital Trends. Then everything ground to a halt. AOL Desktop attempted to load a welcome screen, which caused the software to throw a major tantrum about a DNS error that spanned two separate windows.

Later, I would try and run a test on how long it took for this welcome screen to load. I stopped my timer at two minutes, with the task complete. However, clicking New Tab made the page load instantly, albeit with some images missing. As I wondered how to factor this into my testing, the software crashed, and I was forced to call upon Task Manager. I persevered, and decided to load Google. It took around 30 seconds to load the search engine to a usable state, and around 45 seconds to load everything, including superficial components like the Google logo.

Speed testing my dial-up connection seemed an exercise in futility. Sure, I can record that information, but the number of shots that even hit the rim would be a more useful metric. Constantly, my connection would drop without warning, seemingly at random.

I wrote a list of words in my notebook to describe my experience grappling with AOL dial-up — nagging, imprecise, fiddly, annoying, frustrating, inconsistent. Why do we ask for your address? Need help? Speak to one of our experts. Call: Data caps. Download speeds. Transfers data to your home for activities like streaming, shopping and browsing social media. Mbps Megabits per second. A unit of measurement used to indicate download and upload speeds.

Upload speeds. Transfer data from your home for activities like video calls, uploading large files, working on online documents and live gaming. Where do you need service? Please select an address. Enter a unit number. Here's how we rate providers. How does dial-up internet work? View internet plans. Is dial-up internet service still available? Who is dial-up internet best for?

How is dial-up internet different from DSL? How fast is dial-up internet? Can I stream TV or music with dial-up internet? Can you get dial-up internet without a phone line? Why does dial-up internet make that noise?