Voice over Internet Protocol
(asked on 1st June 2026) - View Source
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what data her Department holds the percentage of landline telephone connections that have been migrated from the Public Switched Telephone Network to digital voice services.
Answered by
Kanishka Narayan
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The analogue Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) is a privately-owned telecoms network and the decision to upgrade it to digital Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) was taken by the telecoms industry in 2017.
Over 92% of PSTN landlines have already been migrated to VoIP. As of 31 March 2026, fewer than 2.8 million PSTN lines remain operational, down from 35.2 million PSTN lines at the network’s peak.