2025 Fiber Deployment Cost Survey

The Fiber Broadband Association invites you to participate in our annual Fiber Deployment Cost Survey. Your input will provide key metrics from recent projects, helping us establish reliable industry benchmarks.

The survey takes just 15 to 20 minutes to complete and will help address the industry’s ongoing challenge of inconsistent build cost data.

All responses are kept strictly confidential and will be managed by our trusted research partner, Cartesian Inc.

Take the Survey

Earn $100

As a thank you for your participation in the survey, the first 50 respondents will receive a $100 Amazon gift card. Terms and conditions apply.

Please complete the survey by October 31st at 5pm ET to be eligible to receive the gift card.

Terms and Conditions

Survey Instructions and FAQ

What is this survey?

The purpose of this survey is to understand the cost of deploying fiber in various geographic and construction scenarios. Survey results will be anonymized and aggregated in a published report (expected early 2026), with the goal of providing the fiber industry with reliable and accurate insights into deployment costs and trends. FBA will only see anonymized and aggregated results.

If you are not best placed to respond on this topic, please direct this information to a colleague that tracks fiber deployment costs, such as the Head of Network Deployment/Construction or the Program Management Office.

How is the survey structured?

This survey will ask you to consider a recent fiber deployment (i.e., 2025) and answer questions on construction metrics for the Access Network (Passing Costs) and Customer Drops (Connection Costs). This survey will also ask about the extent to which deployment costs have changed for you over the past year, and the extent to which you expect them to change in the coming year.

What does this survey consider to be a deployment?

For this survey, a deployment project refers to any last-mile deployment, from a small neighborhood edge-out to a full city expansion. The important thing is that you have metrics that are specific to a deployment or typical to your business this year.

We’re most interested in projects that are typical for your firm.

Note this excludes middle mile buildouts/costs, which NTIA defines as infrastructure that aggregates large quantities of traffic for carriage between networks and does not typically reach the end user’s location.

What do I need to have prepared before taking the survey?

Before you start the survey, it would be beneficial to have the following information on hand. Once in hand, the survey itself should take roughly 15 minutes.

Build Scenario	Geographic region (i.e., State or Territory) Rough estimate of population density based on homes per route miles Terrain type (e.g., rocky, soft soil) Project type (e.g., edge-out, overbuild)
Access Network	Deployment type: Aerial and/or Underground Pole ownership (for aerial deployment) Construction/installation method Labor type (Internal or outsourced) Deployment Pace (feet per day, crew size)
Access Network Costs	Average cost per foot of network ($): Labor Materials Share of total project costs (%): Make-ready costs Permitting Engineering Deployment Costs Note: When determining the cost of internal labor, please use fully-loaded costs where possible
Customer Drops	Drop type: Aerial and/or underground Average cost per drop ($): Labor Materials Average length of the customer drops Note: Exclude costs to install inside the customer premises for this section

Please provide your best estimate if unable to track down data for any of the questions; otherwise, you may skip ones you are completely unable to answer.

Also note there will be space at the end of the cost sections to provide additional context about the project for unique circumstances that impacted the reported costs.

Please reach out to Deborah Kish at dkish@fiberbroadband.org or Megan Corriveau at megan.corriveau@cartesian.com with any additional questions.

Ready to take the survey?

Click Here to Start

View Last Year's Report

2024 Fiber Deployment Cost Report

Findings highlight the continued expansion of fiber networks into rural areas, previously underserved communities, and even locations with competitive fiber providers, with 7.8% of U.S. locations now served by multiple networks. Major industry players, such as AT&T and Verizon, have committed to aggressive deployment goals, while smaller operators, municipalities, and cooperatives are also playing a pivotal role in increasing fiber accessibility nationwide.

Download the Report