With businesses looking for faster internet speeds and families increasingly using the internet to run everything from home security systems to video doorbells and smart refrigerators, area cable companies are racing to expand ultra-fast networks across Connecticut to stay ahead of consumer demand.

In recent months, Cox and Comcast have announced major rollouts of gigabit internet service, which offer speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second, for residential and business customers in their territories around the state, including Greater Hartford.

Frontier announced in early October that it was introducing gigabit service in its FiOS and Vantage Fiber markets, the latter of which includes parts of Connecticut.

Meanwhile, a small, Rochester, N.Y.-based internet startup, GoNetspeed, is hoping to compete with the big guys, introducing a slightly lower-priced gigabit service through new fiber-to-the-home networks it is building in West Hartford, New Haven and Bridgeport, with plans to expand statewide if there's enough demand.