Telecommunications in Bhutan includes telephones, radio, television, and the Internet.

Telephones

* Main lines: 27,900 lines in use, 179th in the world (2012)."Communications"
Bhutan, ''World Factbook'', U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, 5 December 2013. Retrieved 25 December 2013. * Mobile cellular: 560,000 lines, 165th in the world (2012). * Telephone system: ** general assessment: Urban towns and district headquarters have telecommunications services (2012); ** domestic: very low tele-density, domestic service is poor especially in rural areas, mobile cellular service available since 2003 is now widely available (2012); ** international: international telephone and telegraph service via landline and microwave relay through

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

(2012); ** satellite earth station: 1 Intelsat (2012). *

Country codes Country codes are short alphabetic or numeric geographical codes ( geocodes) developed to represent countries and dependent areas, for use in data processing and communications. Several different systems have been developed to do this. The term ...

: Bhutan +975,

Phuentsholing Phuntsholing, also spelled as Phuentsholing ( dz, ཕུན་ཚོགས་གླིང་), is a border town in southern Bhutan and is the administrative seat of Chukha District. The town occupies parts of both Phuentsholing Gewog and Sampheli ...

(0)1,

Thimphu Thimphu (; dz, ཐིམ་ཕུག ) is the capital city, capital and largest city of Bhutan. It is situated in the western central part of Bhutan, and the surrounding valley is one of Bhutan's ''dzongkhags'', the Thimphu District. The ancient ...

(0)2, Bumthang (0)3, Paro (0)8.

Radio and television

* First radio station, Radio NYAB, privately launched in 1973, is now state-owned (2012). * Five private radio stations are currently broadcasting (2012). * Radios: 37,000 (1997). * The

Bhutan Broadcasting Service The Bhutan Broadcasting Service (BBS, dz, འབྲུག་རྒྱང་བསྒྲགས་ལས་འཛིན) is the state-owned radio and television service in Bhutan. A public service corporation which is fully funded by the state and ...

first commenced television transmissions in June 1999, upon legalizing television, one of the last countries in the world to do so. * Cable TV service offers dozens of Indian and other international channels (2012). * Televisions: 11,000 (1999).

Internet

Top level domain A top-level domain (TLD) is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet after the root domain. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in ...

.bt .bt is the Internet country code top-level domain ( ccTLD) for the Kingdom of Bhutan. It is administered by the Ministry of Information and Communication. Domains and Subdomains Domains and Subdomains with registration qualification requirement ...

* Internet hosts: 14,590 hosts, 126th in the world (2012). *

IPv4 Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is the fourth version of the Internet Protocol (IP). It is one of the core protocols of standards-based internetworking methods in the Internet and other packet-switched networks. IPv4 was the first version de ...

: 23,552 addresses allocated, 32.9 per 1000 people (2012).Population

The World Factbook ''The World Factbook'', also known as the ''CIA World Factbook'', is a reference resource produced by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) with almanac-style information about the countries of the world. The official print version is available ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...

. Accessed on 2 April 2012. Note: Data are mostly for 1 July 2012. *

Internet users The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

: 182,338 users, 155th in the world; 25.4% of the population, 137th in the world (2012)."Percentage of Individuals using the Internet 2000-2012"
International Telecommunication Union (Geneva), June 2013, retrieved 22 June 2013Calculated using penetration rate and population data fro
"Countries and Areas Ranked by Population: 2012"
, Population data, International Programs, U.S. Census Bureau, retrieved 26 June 2013 * Fixed broadband: 16,015 subscriptions, 135th in the world; 2.2% of population, 124th in the world (2012)."Fixed (wired)-broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants 2012"
Dynamic Report, ITU ITC EYE,

International Telecommunication Union The International Telecommunication Union is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information and communication technologies. It was established on 17 May 1865 as the International Telegraph Unio ...

. Retrieved on 29 June 2013. *

Mobile broadband Mobile broadband is the marketing term for Wireless broadband, wireless Internet access via mobile networks. Access to the network can be made through a portable modem, wireless modem, or a Tablet computer, tablet/smartphone (possibly Tetherin ...

: 17,851 subscriptions, 133rd in the world; 2.5% of population, 122nd in the world (2012)."Active mobile-broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants 2012"
Dynamic Report, ITU ITC EYE,

. Retrieved on 29 June 2013. *

Internet Service Provider An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise private ...

s: Bhutan's main and only ISP is Druknet, owned by Bhutan Telecom. It provides a dial-up service, at a reasonable cost. *

Internet cafe The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

s: Located in most large towns.

References

External links

nic.bt
Bhutan Network Information Center.
www.bbs.bt
Bhutan Broadcasting Service.
Wireless Voice/Data Communication in Remote Bhutan
{{Use dmy dates, date=March 2017

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountainous ...

Telephones

Radio and television

Internet

See also

References

External links