Monthly data traffic has increased to well over 90 exabytes per month which represents a nine fold growth since 2017. Each individual smartphone user is now consuming around 15 gigabytes of data on a monthly basis, and this has gone up from just 2.6 GB per smartphone in 2017. While social media represents a decent sized chunk of this data usage, video streaming appears to be driving most of its growth with all things having been considered and taken into account.
Back in 2017, video streaming represented about 56% of all mobile data consumption. However, in 2022 this percentage is projected to reach 71%, and a recent report from Ericsson is predicting that this will increase further to 80% by 2027. That has been driven in no small part by the propagation of several new video streaming platforms such as TikTok and Netflix, as well as the tremendous growth that more established platforms like YouTube have seen in the previous decade.
With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that rapidly increasing internet speeds coupled with larger and more detailed screens on devices have played a role in this growth as well. That will result in total mobile traffic increasing by 500% by 2027 based on the predictions that Ericsson has made in its report.
In spite of the fact that this is the case, the rate of growth in mobile data consumption is decreasing as it reaches a critical mass and saturates the market. The growth of mobile traffic in the previous five years was around 900%, and it will go down to 500% over the next few years.
This poses a unique problem for telecom companies and data networks as they struggle to cope with the higher demand. Consumers are using more data by the day, and their increased usage of various streaming apps and video platforms is likely going to make matters worse. It will be interesting to see if they are able to cope with it or if they buckle under the pressure.
H/T: Statista
Read next: Here’s How Much Stolen Data is Sold For on the Dark Web
Back in 2017, video streaming represented about 56% of all mobile data consumption. However, in 2022 this percentage is projected to reach 71%, and a recent report from Ericsson is predicting that this will increase further to 80% by 2027. That has been driven in no small part by the propagation of several new video streaming platforms such as TikTok and Netflix, as well as the tremendous growth that more established platforms like YouTube have seen in the previous decade.
With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that rapidly increasing internet speeds coupled with larger and more detailed screens on devices have played a role in this growth as well. That will result in total mobile traffic increasing by 500% by 2027 based on the predictions that Ericsson has made in its report.
In spite of the fact that this is the case, the rate of growth in mobile data consumption is decreasing as it reaches a critical mass and saturates the market. The growth of mobile traffic in the previous five years was around 900%, and it will go down to 500% over the next few years.
This poses a unique problem for telecom companies and data networks as they struggle to cope with the higher demand. Consumers are using more data by the day, and their increased usage of various streaming apps and video platforms is likely going to make matters worse. It will be interesting to see if they are able to cope with it or if they buckle under the pressure.
H/T: Statista
Read next: Here’s How Much Stolen Data is Sold For on the Dark Web
