Uzbekistan reports 95.5 per cent highway and 98.1 per cent fibre coverage

Uzbekistan's mobile networks cover 95.5 per cent of its international highways and its fibre-optic lines reach 98.1 per cent of settlements, just short of 2026 targets, Sherzod Shermatov, the Minister of Digital Technologies, said in a reply the Legislative Chamber noted on 20 October.

The reply answers a parliamentary inquiry that the chamber decided to send at a sitting reported on 29 September by the state news agency UzA. UzA's account says the targets of the Digital Uzbekistan 2030 strategy for 2026 include mobile internet on 96 per cent of highways of international importance, fibre-optic lines to 98.2 per cent of settlements and an international internet connection speed of 4,500 Gbit/s. The inquiry asked the minister for substantiated explanations of the work on high-speed internet for regions and social facilities, broadband mobile coverage of settlements, mobile internet on international highways and fibre coverage of settlements.

The Milliy Tiklanish (National Revival) Democratic Party faction of the Legislative Chamber, the lower house, considered the reply at a meeting the chamber reported on 19 October. The full chamber took note of it on 20 October, with 124 deputies voting in favour and none against, abstaining or not voting, the voting record for that sitting shows.

Close on all three

Mobile communications and internet now reach 99.5 per cent of settlements, the faction's account says. More than 11,000 mobile base stations have been installed since the start of 2026, bringing the total to 110,500, and 95.5 per cent of the international highways have mobile internet; the plan is to reach 96 per cent by the end of the year. Fibre-optic lines have grown from 119,500 km in 2020 to 397,000 km, 3.3 times the length, and reach 98.1 per cent of settlements. The same account says 10,657 schools, 6,988 kindergartens, 5,786 health facilities and 8,935 mahalla citizens' assemblies are fully covered by the internet.

On international capacity, the reply gives the same number as UzA's account of the inquiry. Capacity of connections to international networks stood at 1,200 Gbit/s in 2020 and has reached 4,400 Gbit/s, with 4,500 Gbit/s expected by the end of 2026 and 5,000 Gbit/s targeted for 2030, UzDaily reported from the reply. Backbone capacity rose from 400 to 600 Gbit/s at regional level and from 40 to 60 Gbit/s at district level compared with 2020, the same report says. When the chamber sent the inquiry, UzA's account put the total capacity of international internet gateways at 94 Gbit/s in 2017 and 4,400 Gbit/s in 2025, so the reply reports no increase on the 2025 figure, with 100 Gbit/s to add by the end of the year.

What the reply leaves out

The chamber's account summarises the reply rather than publishing it, and neither that account nor UzDaily's report splits the base stations between 4G and 5G or gives a 5G count. Neither gives the number of homes or businesses connected to fibre, as distinct from settlements reached, or says how a settlement or a highway counts as covered, or whether the 397,000 km measures cable routes or fibres. The reply says Uzbekistan rose from 133rd to 72nd place in an international ranking of mobile internet speed and from 112th to 73rd for fixed internet speed, first in Central Asia, without naming the ranking or the month. The first edition of Corridor Signal's 5G Scorecard found no published 5G figures for Uzbekistan, and the reply, as reported, adds none.

Quality, by the appeals count

UzA's account of the sitting that sent the inquiry also said that, alongside infrastructure, the quality and coverage of internet services for the population had to expand, particularly in remote areas, social facilities and transport routes. Uzkomnazorat, the inspectorate that handles appeals about communications services, received 7,215 appeals from January to September 2026, it reported on 13 October, against 5,854 in the same period of 2025, Backhaul's sum of the 5,731 from individuals and 123 from organisations it lists. Internet services drew 3,593 appeals, 2,913 of them about service quality, and mobile services 2,567, of which 1,969 concerned quality. The inspectorate traced 561 appeals to the fault of service providers and issued 289 binding instructions; the fixes it lists include work on problems in communication lines and on the operation of base stations.

Deputies at the faction meeting found that every question in the inquiry had been answered in full, the chamber's account says, and UzDaily reported that deputies at the sitting called for an objective assessment of the work and for the strategy's targets to be met on time. Jamol Makhsudov, the deputy minister of digital technologies, gave similar coverage figures to an ITU forum in Dushanbe in late September, Corridor Signal reported, and a World Bank-financed project has delivered a design for rural broadband partnerships, as reported on 23 October. The three targets fall due at the end of 2026.