Cambodia’s Internet Boom or Digital Doom? Inside the Kingdom’s Connected Revolution
Cambodia’s internet landscape has transformed rapidly over the past decade, heavily favoring wireless over wired connectivity. Mobile broadband is the primary backbone of internet access, with over 22 million cellular subscriptions in a country of ~17 million people datareportal.com – a penetration of 131.5%. Major cities are blanketed by 3G/4G networks, and even 4G LTE service now reaches most districts. In contrast, fixed broadband remains limited mainly to urban centers. As of early 2023, there were only about 310,000 fixed internet subscriptions nationwide developingtelecoms.com, reflecting the still-nascent fiber-optic rollout compared to mobile. Cambodia’s fiber-optic backbone is growing – with domestic trunk lines laid along highways and new submarine cable projects underway – but last-mile fiber-to-the-home is available to relatively few. International bandwidth historically transited through Thailand and Vietnam, but Cambodia is expanding its direct connections. The country’s first submarine cable landed in 2017, and an upgraded submarine link from Hong Kong to Sihanoukville is planned for 2024 developingtelecoms.com. Funded by Chinese investment, this new high-capacity cable will replace older links and add 640 km of undersea fiber within Cambodia’s territory developingtelecoms.com, aiming to make internet service faster and cheaper. The core backbone is operated by a few players, which interconnect
