Sources: Openreach, July 2026. BT Wholesale, November 2025. Rate calculations by The VoIP Shop.

The Full Openreach Stop Sell Tranche History

Openreach announces stop sell in tranches. Each announcement is made separately, and the individual numbers look unremarkable. Assembled into one series, the shape of the programme becomes clear.



Below is the complete history from the first Salisbury pilot in December 2020 to Tranche 22 in November 2026.

A further 15 exchanges have been removed from stop sell. The BT Wholesale register lists 1,747 exchanges in total.



A note on reconciliation. The published tranche totals, plus the undated exchanges, plus those removed, come to 1,748 against a stated total of 1,747. That single exchange difference is present in the source document. We have reproduced the figures as published rather than adjusting them.

Which Year Carries the Most Stop Sell Exchanges?

2026 is the largest year of the programme by a wide margin.

One third of a programme that began in December 2020 is being delivered in its final year.

Tranche 19, activating on 14 February 2026, covered 170 exchanges on its own. That is exactly the same number Openreach delivered across the whole of 2023, spread over four separate tranches. It remains the largest single tranche in the programme's history.

Tranche 20 followed in June 2026 with 164. Tranche 21 activates on 19 August 2026 with 137.



From the first pilot through to Tranche 18, tranche sizes ranged from 13 to 115 exchanges, with a median of 51. From Tranche 19 onward the range is 94 to 170. The programme roughly tripled in pace as the deadline approached.

Does Stop Sell End When the PSTN Is Switched Off?

No. Stop sell continues past 31 January 2027.

This is one of the most common misunderstandings about the programme, and it matters for planning.



Tranche 22 activates on 6 November 2026, inside the switch off window. But Openreach notified a further 112 exchanges on 27 July 2026, and providers receive twelve months notice before a stop sell activates. That places those exchanges in mid 2027, months after the analogue network is gone.

The reason is scope. Stop sell restricts the sale of copper based products in general, not only analogue voice. It covers copper broadband as well. The 31 January 2027 date ends the PSTN. Stop sell continues until copper itself is retired.

How Stop Sell Works

Stop sell is triggered when full fibre becomes available to more than 75 per cent of premises connected to a given exchange. Openreach gives communications providers twelve months notice before it activates.

Once active, customers on that exchange who want to switch, upgrade, or regrade cannot take a copper based product. Existing services are not disconnected.

Products withdrawn under the programme include WLR3 analogue, ISDN2, ISDN30, SMPF, and Narrowband Line Share and Classic products.

For what this means in practice for a business, and what to do about it, see our PSTN switch off guide.

Notified versus active: two different numbers

Coverage of the programme uses two figures that are often conflated.

Notified exchanges have received the twelve month stop sell notice but the restriction is not yet in force.

Active exchanges have a live stop sell. Openreach confirmed on 27 July 2026 that stop sell will be active in 1,572 exchanges by 20 August 2026, covering approximately 15.4 million premises, which is 57 per cent of its full fibre footprint.



Both figures are correct. They measure different stages, and they are not interchangeable.

How Many Remaining PSTN Lines Belong to Businesses?

Nearly one in four. 350,000 of the 1.5 million remaining lines, or 23.3 per cent

Businesses are over represented in the tail of the migration, and they carry more dependencies per line than households do.



A residential line usually carries a phone. A business line frequently carries a payment terminal, a lift alarm, a fire alarm panel, a door entry system, a franking machine, or a CCTV link.

Openreach specifically named payment terminals, lift alarms, and security systems among the services at risk. Once the network is withdrawn, these may stop working unless they have been upgraded or replaced with digital alternatives.

A household that misses the deadline loses a phone. A business that misses it can lose the ability to take payment.

What Is Happening to Line Rental Prices?

Openreach Wholesale Line Rental will cost double its early 2026 price by 1 October 2026.

Alongside the increases, Openreach has introduced migration incentives including free or discounted connection to SOGEA where full fibre is not yet available, the Equinox pricing scheme, a try before you buy offer on new to network full fibre orders, an offer on existing Ethernet Access Direct lines at 1Gbps and below, and free connection for providers migrating legacy voice only lines.



The practical effect is that staying on an analogue line is now becoming more expensive than moving off it.

Where Has Full Fibre Rollout Reached?

Source: Openreach, 27 July 2026

Regional Example: Leicestershire

To show how the national programme lands locally, we extracted every Leicestershire exchange from the BT Wholesale register.

26 Leicestershire exchanges are in the stop sell programme.

Melton Mowbray was notified separately as part of Tranche 25 on 27 July 2026, and is not yet in the published register.

Three county towns worth calling out:

• Loughborough stop sell activates on 19 August 2026, alongside Hathern, Syston and Ashby de la Zouch
• Coalville has been under stop sell since 26 May 2025
• Hinckley has been under stop sell since 17 February 2025

Seven Leicester city exchanges are already under stop sell: Stoneygate, Kirby Muxloe, Saint Barnabas, Evington, Thurnby, Glenfield and Oadby.

For a wider view of which UK areas are affected and when, see our UK landline switch off cities map.

What This Means for UK Businesses

Three practical conclusions follow from the data.

Capacity is the constraint, not awareness. 2,756 businesses per working day, for 127 working days, is a demanding schedule for any supply chain. Openreach has said as much. The businesses that migrate early are competing for engineering resource against a much smaller field than those who leave it to December.

The programme accelerated, and most of it happened recently. Of the 1,459 exchanges activated by 31 July 2026, 669 have gone live since the start of 2025. That is 46 per cent of all activations in the most recent 19 months of a programme that began in December 2020. Any assessment of exposure made before 2025 is now out of date.

The risk is rarely the phone. Most businesses know their handsets need replacing. Far fewer have audited the lift alarm, the card terminal, the fire panel, the door entry system, or the CCTV link. Those are the services that fail quietly on 31 January 2027.



Openreach has confirmed it will begin issuing formal notifications to providers with outstanding migrations. Businesses that have not heard from their provider should not read that silence as safety.

Frequently Asked Questions