NBN Co announced on Wednesday 31,000 Bendigo homes and businesses have been included in the national rollout plan, in addition to 9000 in Echuca, 1300 in Red Cliffs and 4900 in Swan Hill.

The announcement did not include the proportion of fixed wireless and direct connections for Bendigo, to be announced at a later date.

The announcement came as both a relief and as a reward for the hard work of iLoddon Mallee, which had lobbied on behalf of the region since Bendigo was left off the rollout list in 2013.

iLoddon Mallee chairman Bruce Winzar welcomed the announcement and said it would help Bendigo catch up with other regional cities for internet speed.

He said specific details of the rollout will be announced in the coming months.

"NBN Co hasn't told us of any specific new locations - that will come out in the next round of announcements," Mr Winzar said.

"I expect we will have a clearer view of which areas are provided for in the next six months.

"The rollout will be a mix of fibre to the node and fixed wireless."

Mr Winzar said the design of the rollout in Bendigo will start immediately.

The City of Greater Bendigo will hold community consultation sessions in the next 12 months and liaise with NBN Co to ensure the latest information is relayed to Bendigo residents and businesses.

Once connected, homes and businesses can expect internet speeds of between 25 and 100 Megabits per second.

iLoddon Mallee celebrated the announcement with a visit to Keech 3D on Wednesday - one of the countless businesses in Bendigo eagerly awaiting faster broadband speeds after the disappointment of 2013.

The group's business case, presented to the federal government last month, used a number of case studies of businesses in central Victoria crying out for greater internet speeds.

Examples included post production company The Red Lodge in Chewton, media arts business IDEAS Agency of Castlemaine and robotics business Foodmach in Echuca.

Keech 3D also played its part in the submission, arguing high speed broadband "can't get here quickly enough".

Keech chief executive officer Herbert Hermens said the current internet speeds were a hindrance to the business, which relies on uploading and sharing massive files for 3D printing.

"Just as an example, it's taken our engineers five hours to upload information to Melbourne - if they'd driven to Lockwood and done it from there, it would have been much quicker," he said.

"With faster internet speeds, we will be able to interact with people all over the world."

The business recently chose to send a USB device with information to Indonesia by mail, rather than try to send it over the internet.

The decision saved Keech time, but Dr Hermens said the situation was far from ideal.

"It's one of the main impediments for our business," he said.

The rollout of the NBN could be one of the main political issues in the lead-up to next year's federal election.

Member for Bendigo Lisa Chesters said the announcement was a "half-baked" version of the rollout map Labor released two years ago.

"Under the federal Liberal government's proposal, households and businesses could be stung for thousands just to connect to the NBN," she said.

"It's not fair that Bendigo households and businesses will have to not only wait longer but will have to pay more to receive the same NBN infrastructure and service as Ballarat."

Ms Chesters said the initial fibre to the home plan would have delivered significantly faster broadband speeds for Bendigo.

NBN Co spokesperson Trent Williams said the "flexible multi-technology approach" was an important step to reaching eight million NBN connections in Australia by 2020.