New FiOS top speed is half that of Google Fiber—and 4x the price

In an attempt to go after more lucrative, higher-revenue customers, Verizon announced Monday that it would be boosting its FiOS service to 500Mbps—for $310 per month. By comparison, in original Google Fiber locale Kansas City, 1Gbps of service starts at just $70 per month. (Comcast charges $320 for 305Mbps speeds on its network.)

Last year, Verizon boosted its speeds to 300Mbps—of course, that’s still limited to the small part of the United States where FiOS is available. (Verizon has essentially halted new FiOS rollouts, meaning that if it's not available in your area, it’s unlikely to show up anytime soon—for now, only 5.8 million Americans have Verizon’s fiber service.)

While rollout of significantly faster broadband across North America is limited, we’ve reported on developments in some parts of Northern California, Vancouver (Canada), rural Vermont, and Seattle. And Google Fiber is only reaching specific areas of the Midwest and Western United States and probably won’t be nationwide anytime soon.

However, one Verizon technician told Bloomberg that the company is holding back. “We can support up to 10Gbps on our network,” said Fowler Abercrombie, a manager of the FiOS development team in Irving, Texas. “We’re watching the market to see where it goes next.”