Internet in Santa Maria, California

Who reports service in Santa Maria

The FCC counts 23,564 homes and businesses ("locations") inside Santa Maria's city limits as drawn for the 2020 Census. As of June 30, 2026 (file revision of November 10, 2026), Xfinity reports service at 99.7% of them, almost entirely over cable, with advertised downloads up to 2 Gbps. Frontier reports service at 62.4% and fiber at 62.2%, with plans advertised up to 7 Gbps. Astound reports fiber at 8.7%¹. Everything else on the list is fixed wireless or satellite.

"Available" here means a provider told the FCC it offers service, or could install it within ten business days; residents can challenge a listing on the FCC National Broadband Map. The table describes the city as a whole, not any one street.

Copper out, fiber in

In the first National Broadband Map release, for June 30, 2022, DSL over telephone copper was reported at 54.5%² of Santa Maria's locations. By December 31, 2025 it was down to 0.4%³, and in the June 2026 release it stands at 0.4%, a fall of 54.1 percentage points. Statewide, DSL is still reported at 43.7%¹ of locations.

Over the same four years fiber rose from 48.0% to 67.0%, an increase of 19.0 percentage points. The two changes are not the same size, so the record is not a simple line-for-line swap of copper for fiber. Over the same period the share of locations with a single wired provider at 100/20 Mbps fell from 51.8%² to 32.8%¹. Fiber coverage was unchanged between December 2025 and June 2026.

June 30, 2022December 31, 2025June 30, 2026

DSL available0.4% −54.1 pts

Fiber available67.0% +19.0 pts

Wired 100/100 Mbps79.5% +31.5 pts

Two or more wired choices66.9% +19.1 pts

Source: FCC, National Broadband Map, data as of June 30, 2022; FCC, National Broadband Map, data as of December 31, 2025; FCC, National Broadband Map, data as of June 30, 2026. Shares of broadband serviceable locations in each FCC release (latest revision of each); the small number is the change in percentage points since June 30, 2022. The FCC's count of locations is updated with each release, so shares are compared rather than counts.

Show the numbers

Measure	June 30, 2022	December 31, 2025	June 30, 2026	Change (points)
DSL available	54.5%	0.4%	0.4%	−54.1 pts
Fiber available	48.0%	66.9%	67.0%	19.0 pts
Wired 100/100 Mbps	48.0%	79.2%	79.5%	31.5 pts
Two or more wired choices	47.8%	66.9%	66.9%	19.1 pts

The fiber shows up in the upload figures. Symmetrical wired service of at least 100/100 Mbps was advertised at 48.0%² of locations in 2022 and at 79.5% now; the FCC's gigabit tier with fast uploads (1,000/100 Mbps) reaches 79.5%. A 1 Gbps download alone, which Xfinity's cable also advertises, is reported at 99.7%. At 79.5%¹ of locations the fastest advertised download is 2 Gbps or more. All of these are providers' advertised maximums, not measured speeds.

Where Xfinity is the only wire

As fiber spread, so did wired choice. The share of locations with two or more wired providers at 100/20 Mbps rose by 19.1 percentage points since 2022, to 66.9%, above California's 49.9%. Elsewhere one wire remains: at 32.8% of locations Xfinity is the only wired provider offering 100/20 Mbps, the 119th highest¹ single-wire share among the 343 cities of 100,000 or more.

NoneOneTwoThree or more

Santa Maria

Santa Barbara County

California

United States

Source: FCC, National Broadband Map, data as of June 30, 2026. Different wired providers (fiber, cable or DSL; FCC provider IDs) reporting 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up or more at the same location. Fixed wireless and satellite are not counted.

Show the numbers

Area	None	One	Two	Three or more
Santa Maria	0.3%	32.8%	62.9%	4.0%
Santa Barbara County	5.4%	37.4%	56.1%	1.1%
California	6.9%	43.2%	43.4%	6.5%
United States	7.8%	36.6%	44.6%	11.1%

Three or more wired choices are rare. Frontier's and Astound's fiber overlap at only 4.0% of locations, and 4.0% have three or more wired providers at 100/20 Mbps. Only 65¹ locations have no wired provider at that speed.

Fixed wireless covers less than it did

Licensed fixed wireless, which includes 5G home internet from the mobile carriers, is reported at 71.1% of Santa Maria's locations, a share that ranks the lowest among large cities. It was reported at 94.4%² in June 2022 and at 88.0% in December 2025, so the June 2026 filing shows a drop of 16.9 percentage points in six months. The share where licensed fixed wireless reaches 100/20 Mbps fell further, from 54.3%³ to 22.4%¹.

T-Mobile reports the widest wireless footprint, at 64.2% of locations, but offers 100/20 Mbps at 14.0%. Ranch Wifi, which reported no service in the city in 2022, now reports unlicensed fixed wireless at 100/20 Mbps at 22.2%¹ of locations. Wireless capacity is shared on each tower sector, so a reported area is not a promise that every address can sign up.

Santa Maria among Central Coast and valley cities

The copper-to-fiber shift is not shared by every nearby city. Oxnard, where Frontier reports fiber at 59.9%¹ of locations, shows a similar drop in DSL; Salinas, Ventura and Bakersfield still have DSL at most locations and fiber at well under half.

Across Santa Barbara County, fiber reaches 59.7% of locations, the 8th highest¹ share among California's counties. The California page maps every county.

What households subscribe to

The Census Bureau's 2025 American Community Survey counts households, not locations. It estimates that 73.3% of Santa Maria households had a cable, fiber or DSL subscription (margin of error ±4.0 percentage points); by point estimate that ranks tied for 49th lowest among large cities. 15.2% relied only on a cellular data plan (±4.3 percentage points), and 8.8% reported a satellite subscription (±3.2 percentage points), which ranks tied for 25th highest⁴ among large cities, although wired service at 100/20 Mbps is reported at 99.7%¹ of locations. With margins this wide, the survey points to a gap between wired availability and wired subscriptions rather than measuring it exactly.