BT Broadband Information and Advice

BT Broadband pricing:

• For the latest prices, see www.bt.com/btbroadband
  
  
  

If you're looking to get BT Broadband, you need to see if BT can offer it to your home via your telephone exchange.

Use the BT Line Checker to find out what speed you should get - enter your phone number and postcode at the speedchecker: bt.com/btbroadband - this check will identify if you already have broadband. If not, you'll get an estimate of your top speed if you were to sign up with BT Broadband.

Unlike many UK broadband providers, BT offers a free technical support helpline. If you're with BT and need technical help, call 0800 111 4567 , 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

In July 2009, BT announced that they would be bringing their call centres back to the UK after using call centres in India.

Here's some information that may be of use to help with your BT Broadband connectivity setting, including BT's POP3 and SMTP server addresses:

• Logon username: Created when setting up your account - example: yourusername@btbroadband.com
• Logon password: No password is required, as BT uses the phone number you're connecting via for authentication. If your router needs one, use "BT"
• Encapsulation: PPPoA or PPP over ATM
• 15,800.00 VC-based or VC Mux
• VPI/VCI: 0/38
• BT Broadband Primary DNS address:62.6.40.162
• BT Broadband Secondary DNS address: 194.72.0.98
• Incoming POP email server: mail.btinternet.com
• Outgoing SMTP email server: mail.btinternet.com (Sending email requires SMTP server authentication - you need to enter your BT Broadband account's username and password as well as your SMTP address)
  

Screenshot of BT email server information entered into Outlook 2003:


Outlook 2003 SMTP Authentication settings ('More settings' > 'Outgoing server'):

More info on our Setting up Outlook e-mail page

If you find that you're able to receive emails, but you're having problems sending email from your BT Broadband account, there are two things you need to check:

1. First, check that you are using the right SMTP address, and that you are using SMTP authentication. Check your settings carefully - see the FAQ on SMTP settings. More on SMTP.
   
   
2. If your outgoing email address is different from your BTinternet.com email address, you may find you get an error 553 when sending emails - this is because BT requires you to register non-BT email addresses, so that they know they're legit. To register your non-BT email address, go to http://bt.yahoo.com/webmail, sign in with your BTinternet address. Go to Yahoo! Mail, select Options (on the right), then "Mail options", "Accounts", "Add or edit", and add an account for your non-BT email address.

The BT Home Hub is BT's wi-fi enabled Broadband modem. It's provided for free on some BT Broadband plans, and is also available from BT Shop. Some things worth knowing:

• You can only use the BT Home Hub on the BT Broadband network
  
  
• The Home Hub has four Ethernet sockets and supports Wi-fi
  
  
• If you want to configure the Home Hub, you need to log on using a web-browser running on a connected PC or Mac. See the Home Hub FAQ for help on how to do this.
  
  
• You'll need BT Broadband and a Home Hub to get BT Vision - films and BT shows downloaded to your telly. BT Vision Information

For more on the BT Home Hub, see our Home Hub page, our Home Hub FAQ, or listen online to Show 9 of FrequencyCast, our online radio show.

If you have BT Broadband at home, you may want to go wireless. The BT Home Hub supports wireless, and if your PC or laptop already supports wireless, then you're good to go. See our Wi-fi Explained page for help.

Not got wireless on your laptop or PC? Then you'll need a wi-fi USB dongle, such as the Belkin WiFi USB. The one pictured here supports the newer 802.11N standard and is easy to set up. We have a page of information on how to get wireless Internet at home

If you're having problems with BT Broadband, first off, check that their services are running correctly at their Service Status page. Check the BT Broadband status page for info on any problems with BT Broadband, or local exchanges.
Alternatively, call free on 0800 169 0199.

Having problems with Broadband? See our Broadband Problems section

By default, with your BT Broadband account, you will be set up with an BT email address. This will be in the format username@btinternet.com.

With BT Broadband, you can have up to eleven different email addresses. If you want to create another email address, go to www.btyahoo.com, sign in with your BT Internet email addresses, go to "My account" and select "Manage Sub Accounts".

Having problems with Broadband? See our Broadband Problems section

If you want to check the speed of your BT Broadband connection, you can use BT's Speedchecker Go to www.speedtester.bt.com . To get to the detailed results, you'll need to enter a username, which is bthomehub.

If you use an Apple Mac, you can use BT Broadband. The BT Home Hub connects to your home phone line, and allows you to connect using a wired Ethernet connection or a wi-fi connection.

You don't need any special software installed to use the BT Home Hub or your BT Broadband connection. You can manage the BT Home Hub's software via a web browser.

In 2006, BT introduced video calling over BT Broadband. The service uses BT Broadband Talk, which offers voice calling over Broadband (for cheaper calls). Broadband Talk also supports videocalling, either with BT's Softphone application (on a PC), or one of BT's range of videophones.

For more info, see our Videocalling page, or our reviews of the Videophone 1000 and Videophone 2000 handsets

BT Broadband customers can access their email via the webmail service.

• Go to bt.yahoo.com
• Enter your username (e.g. yourname@btinternet.com) and password
• From under the heading "BT Yahoo! Mail Preview", select "Inbox"

Details of a problem we experienced, in case it's of use to anyone else. The fault:

• BT Home Hub Broadband, Wireless and Data lights on
• BT Home Hub Phone and Internet lights off
• BT Home Hub diagnostic reporting DSL ok, but ATM and PPP not ok
• Normal landline phone working

From what we could tell, it looked like we were getting a connection to the exchange, as the Broadband light was on, but no Internet connection. After phoning BT, we were told to log onto the Home Hub software, go to Advanced, then to Internet. This showed us as 'Disconnected'. The instruction was to overtype the username with 'bt_test_user@startup_domain' (blank password) and try to connect. This connection worked. We then were told to enter 'user@btbroadband.com' (blank password) to get back to normal. Seemed to solve our problem. BT said it was a username authentication issue.

• How to get your free Openzone Minutes - You should be sent a username and password for BT Openzone by email within 2 weeks of BT Broadband. If you don't get it, call 0800 800 150, follow the options for Broadband Sales, then ask them to send out the Openzone email

Got a question?

Thinking of getting BT Broadband, and have a question? Contact us