There are roughly 7.8 billion people in the world today and around 4.66 million use the internet. That is close to 60% of the world’s population. This number is still growing as there are 319 million new users added in the past 12 months.
According to Oberlo, people spend time on the internet at an average of 6 hours and 30 minutes. They go online to connect with colleagues, family, and friends. They engage in different social media platforms to connect to the world. They perform financial transactions like banking, bills payment, fund transfers, and online shopping. They play games and watch live streaming or recorded shows on Video On Demand platforms.
Australian households need reliable NBN plans to engage in these internet activities. Matching an NBN plan with your internet needs is quite a challenge. To do so, you should identify which internet activities consume most of your data?
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What is Internet Usage?
Internet usage is the measurement of the amount of data consumed for different online activities. They may be expressed in bytes, kilobytes (KB), megabytes (MB), or gigabytes (GB). A byte is the basic unit of internet usage measurement and a word on the internet typically consumes 2 bytes. There are 1,000 bytes for every KB, 1,000 KB for every MB, and 1,000 MB for every GB.
Every internet activity has a matching data consumption or usage.
- Receiving or sending emails without attachments consumes 20 KB.
- Receiving or sending emails with attachments consumes 300 KB.
- Regular web browsing uses 10 to 60 MB per hour.
- Social media browsing like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn uses 120 MB per hour.
- Streaming music or on the radio consumes 150 MB per hour.
- Streaming on YouTube consumes 350 MB per hour.
- Streaming an HD video uses 2 GB per hour.
- Downloading a text document uses 2 MB.
- Downloading a music track consumes 4 MB.
- Downloading a non-HD film consumes 700 MB to 1 GB.
- Downloading an HD film consumes 4 GB.
The best NBN plans can support all the above mentioned internet activities. Commonly, they provide unlimited data usage for consumers not to worry about exceeding their data caps or limits.
What Internet Activities Consume the Most of Your Data?
Although the best NBN plans offer unlimited data usage, there are times when your internet bandwidth slows down. Some apps, programs, or websites may be using a large amount of data. These result in the slowing down of your internet speed. So, it is best to identify what internet activities consume most of your data.
Video Streaming Services
The number one internet activity consuming the most of your data is video streaming. Thus, finding the best NBN plans for streaming has been quite a challenge for most households. Amazon Prime, Disney+, Hulu, Netflix, Stan, and YouTube have become increasingly popular in place of cable cords. Many people binge-watch an entire drama series or TV show in just one weekend. Data usage for a 1-hour video streaming varies depending on the quality of your stream.
- A standard YouTube video at 480p If you stream using the standard video quality option (480p) consumes 360 MB per hour.
- A high-quality YouTube video at 1080p If you stream using the standard video quality option (480p) consumes 900 MB per hour.
- The lowest quality video streaming on Netflix and similar apps use 300 MB per hour.
- A medium-quality video streaming on Netflix and similar apps use 450 MB per hour.
- A medium-quality video streaming on Netflix and similar apps use 1 GB per hour.
Music Streaming Services
The next internet data usage drainer is music streaming services. Amazon Music, Apple Music, Google Play Music, SoundCloud Go, Spotify, and YouTube Music recently increased in popularity. We get the hang of listening to online music while browsing or multi-tasking. We love to play our favourite songs while chilling around the house, cooking, or doing household chores. Streaming a song with the best quality on Spotify and similar music streaming apps uses roughly 2,40 MB per minute.
Online Games
There are around 2.5 billion online gamers in the world today. Most online games consume around 40 MB to 250 MB per hour. But the most popular online games use downloadable content that eats up a lot of data usage.
- Counter-Strike consumes 250 MB per hour.
- Destiny 2 consumes 300 MB per hour.
- Microsoft Flight Simulator consumes 700 MB per hour.
Another thing that adds up to online game data usage is the quality of the video the game uses. Always remember that the higher the video quality, the more internet data is consumed.
Social Media Platforms
Today, social media is the best way to connect with colleagues, family, friends, and the world. We need a strong Internet connection to stay in touch across continents and timezones. The average time people spend on social media every day is 144 minutes or 2 hours and 24 minutes. This translates to using around 308 MB of internet daily. What makes social media platforms 3rd among internet activities that consume most of your data are the video ads showing on their newsfeed and the video chats we commonly engage with. Auto-playing videos and doing video calls on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social networking platforms can use up a significant amount of data, even if there is no direct interaction from the user.