About three million homes in the UK have broadband speeds of less than two megabits per second (2Mbps) according to research commissioned by the BBC.

The government has promised to provide all homes in the UK with speeds of at least 2Mbps by 2012.

The research revealed that so-called notspots are not limited to rural communities, with many in suburban areas and even streets in major towns.

The government has pledged a range of technologies to fill the gaps.

"We had assumed that these notspots were in remote parts of the countryside. That may be where the most vocal campaigners are but there is a high incidence of them in commuter belts," said Alex Salter, co-founder of broadband website SamKnows.

The SamKnows map offers an insight into where the homes are that the government needs to reach out to and connect to faster broadband.

It was created by comparing a sample of UK postcodes with a database of information about which providers offered services in the 5,500 telephone exchanges around the UK.

By working out how far properties were from a particular exchange, a picture of the speed of services can be determined as line length is a crucial factor in determining how fast broadband services will operate.

To get speeds of 2Mbps or more homes need to be 4km or less from an exchange.

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