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ChinaScience

China launches world’s fastest internet with 1.2 terabit per second link, years ahead of forecasts

  • Network can send the equivalent of 150 films per second, three times faster than nearest rival in the US and two years earlier than industry forecasts
  • 3,000km of optical fibre links Beijing-Wuhan-Guangzhou as decade-long infrastructure plan nears completion

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China’s latest high-speed data link forms a backbone network between Beijing in the north and the southern city of Guangzhou, via Wuhan in central China. Shutterstock
Zhang Tongin Beijing
China has beaten a global deadline, launching the world’s first next-generation internet service – more than 10 times faster than existing major routes – two years ahead of industry predictions.

The backbone network – so called because it forms a principal data route between cities – can transmit data at 1.2 terabits (1,200 gigabits) per second between Beijing in the north, central China’s Wuhan and Guangzhou in the southern province of Guangdong.

The line, which spans more than 3,000km (1,860 miles) of optical fibre cabling, was activated in July and officially launched on Monday, after performing reliably and passing all operational tests.

The achievement – a collaboration between Tsinghua University, China Mobile, Huawei Technologies, and Cernet Corporation – smashes expert forecasts that 1 terabit per second ultra-high-speed networks would not emerge until around 2025.

Most of the world’s internet backbone networks operate at just 100 gigabits per second. Even the United States only recently completed the transition to its fifth-generation Internet2 at 400 gigabits per second.

The Beijing-Wuhan-Guangzhou connection is part of China’s Future Internet Technology Infrastructure (FITI), a project 10 years in the making and the latest version of the national China Education and Research Network (Cernet).

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