The UK has some of Europe's best broadband – but campaigners say the countryside is still being left behind.

Ofcom's European Broadband Scorecard shows that the UK leads the EU's five biggest economies on most measures of superfast broadband coverage.

These include take-up, usage and choice for both mobile and fixed broadband, and performs well on price, said the telecoms watchdog.

The report finds that the availability of superfast broadband has increased in the UK from around 60% at the end of 2011 to 73%.

This has taken the country from third to first for coverage among the 'EU5' – namely France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK.

Take-up of superfast broadband, which is capable of providing speeds equal to or greater than 30Mbit/s, had reached nine in every 100 people in the UK at the start of last year.

This was the highest in the EU5 ahead of Spain (6 in 100) in second place.

Ofcom chief executive Ed Richards said the latest figures represented "excellent progress" but there was "more to be done".

"We want to see even wider availability of superfast broadband across the UK, so as many people as possible can enjoy faster speeds to access the internet," said Mr Richards.

"There is also more progress to be made to ensure consumers receive consistently high quality of service, including faster line repairs and installations for broadband and telephony."

Those comments were echoed by Sarah Lee, head of policy at the Countryside Alliance, which campaigns for better rural broadband.

She said: "Broadband is a necessity for modern life, for business, leisure and education, so for the UK to be beating its European rivals, with roll-out at 73% of the population, is very positive.

"However these figures also mean that more than a quarter of the population is still without superfast broadband and these are most likely to be those people who live in the hard to reach areas."

Earlier this month, a survey by NFU Mutual showed that one in five families, predominantly those living in the countryside, said their children didn't have access to online learning resources.

So far this year the government has announced £250m extra money for superfast broadband to help business start-up and job creation in hard-to-reach areas.

It has also unveiled a £10m broadband innovation fund to investigate other ways of providing superfast broadband in remote areas.

"These are the projects that will help to bridge the digital divide between urban and rural businesses and homes," said Ms Lee.

Among the EU5, the UK has the:

* highest broadband take-up (all types, by household), at 83%;
* highest proportion of people to have bought goods online over a year (77%);
* highest weekly usage of the internet (87%);
* lowest proportion of people who have never used the internet (8%).

Ofcom has also analysed a range of broadband product 'baskets', by examining average and lowest prices available for different packages.

The UK comes either first or second within the EU5 on all measures of average price, and either second or third on measures of the lowest available price.