Internet providers in South Dakota
11 of the operators we cover report service somewhere in South Dakota, of which 4 sell fiber. Below is how much of the state each one reaches, how South Dakota compares on choice, and what that means for a specific address.
How much choice does South Dakota actually have?
South Dakota ranks 49 of 52 for wired internet choice, among the worst in the country. 35.8% of homes here have at most one wired company able to serve them, against 15.7% nationally.
Free to cite with attribution to WhereFiber. Rank 1 is the state with the fewest such homes. contact@wherefiber.com
| Measure | South Dakota | United States |
|---|---|---|
| Residential locations | 391,050 | 114,550,235 |
| At most one wireline company in the block | 35.8% | 15.7% |
| In a block with no wired company at all | 0.3% | 1.5% |
| In a block where nobody reports fiber | 17.5% | 27.9% |
| In a block with exactly one fiber company | 71.1% | 52.2% |
| In a block with two or more wired companies, none of them fiber | 13.0% | 17.4% |
South Dakota has less wireline choice than the country as a whole. More of the state sits in blocks where a single company is the only wired option. These are floors rather than estimates, for reasons we set out in the national study. In South Dakota that third row is 1,040 residential locations with no wired option reported by anybody: not fiber, not cable, not copper.
Having a choice is not the same as having a good one. 250,963 South Dakota locations sit in a block with two or more wired companies. Of those, 79.8% have at least one company offering fiber, and 0.0% have nothing but copper between all of the companies reaching them. The last row of the table is the same fact counted against the whole state rather than against the households it applies to.
Two providers compared in South Dakota
Both operators in each pair report service somewhere in South Dakota, so these are choices a reader here might actually face:
Providers serving South Dakota
Share of South Dakota residential locations each operator reports it can reach. A low percentage is not a bad network. It usually means a network concentrated in a few towns.
| Provider | Technology | Share of South Dakota covered |
|---|---|---|
| Midco | Mixed * | 61.0% |
| T-Mobile Home Internet | Fixed Wireless | 51.9% |
| Quantum Fiber | Mixed * | 47.0% |
| Verizon Fios | Mixed * | 41.4% |
| Bluepeak | Mixed * | 34.5% |
| AT&T Fiber | Mixed * | 34.3% |
| Mediacom | Cable | 3.7% |
| Rise Broadband | Fixed Wireless | 3.7% |
| Nextlink Internet | Fixed Wireless | 1.0% |
| Sparklight | Cable | 1.0% |
| Great Plains Communications | Mixed * | Under 0.1% |
* This operator reports several technologies to the FCC nationally, and the federal data does not break that down by state, so we cannot tell you which one reaches a specific address in South Dakota. Read the percentage as the whole company, not the brand. A national carrier files its fiber, its cable, its copper and its fixed wireless under one identifier. We mark a technology plainly only when at least 80% of what that operator reports nationally sits on it, or when its entire filing sits on one technology.
Covers the 79 operators we have mapped from FCC holding-company names to the brand people actually buy. Smaller operators that file under a name we have not yet matched are not listed here, so a local provider missing from this table may still serve you, because the address check below reads the raw filing and will show it.
Check a specific South Dakota address →
Or browse every state and city we cover.
Wired competition in every South Dakota county, ranked, with the fiber gap and gigabit availability alongside. The counties scoring worst on competition are the ones with fiber everywhere, and the page explains why.
What speeds are available across South Dakota
Share of South Dakota homes where at least one provider reports offering that speed on that technology. This is genuine state level data, the level the FCC actually publishes it at.
| Technology | 25/3 Mbps | 100/20 Mbps | 250/25 Mbps | 1 Gbps / 100 Mbps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fiber | 66% | 66% | 66% | 63% |
| Cable | 57% | 56% | 56% | 23% |
| Fixed wireless | 75% | 52% | 1% | 1% |
| Any technology | 100% | 100% | 100% | 77% |
Reading this page honestly
A statewide percentage tells you about South Dakota. It does not tell you about your street. Fiber in particular was built out block by block, and nationally up to one in nine residential locations sits in a block where fiber exists and still does not reach the building, so a provider showing strong statewide coverage here can still tell you no.
Providers report their own coverage to the FCC and the data is known to overstate it. Where a provider says it cannot serve you, it is right and the filing is wrong.
Related: how much choice Americans have, state by state · fiber vs cable · fiber providers · cable providers