Netflix Customers Consume 20% of Bandwidth During Peak Times

Multichannel News cites the Sandvine Annual Bandwidth Report that Netflix streaming accounts for 20% of peak bandwidth.

Netflix represents more than 20% of downstream Internet traffic during peak times in the U.S. -- and is heaviest in the primetime hours of 8 to 10 p.m., according to a new report from bandwidth management equipment vendor Sandvine.

Overall, Internet users in North America still trail other regions in consumption: North American households use a median of 4 Gigabytes per month of Internet bandwidth, whereas in Asia-Pacific region the median is 12 Gigabytes. According to Sandvine's 2009 report, the worldwide monthly median usage last year was 3 Gigabytes.

Comments

[Ethan cooper]

For Internet usage, check out some more current numbers: http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2010/prod_101710.html

Also: http://www.digitalsociety.org/2010/10/world-broadband-comparisons-an-update/

[Del]

Don't most of the Asia-Pacific countries have higher speed internet compared to the US?

[Frank22]

I am concerned about internet providers getting more aggressive as streaming grows. Especially the cable companies that provide internet. They are going to see streaming as cannibalizing their business and are going to want to do something about it. I don't think extra usage costs them much, but they will use that as a reason for caps or variable pricing. This is a major issue in Canada right now where one company that has a monopoly raised prices for higher usage the week before Netflix announced their entry into the market.

I have Verizon DSL and have been streaming nightly. There is no cap or variable pricing, but I do worry it could change. I do think that Verizon might not be as quick to do it because it doesn't cannibalize their other business(I don't have FIOS in my area).

[Clay]

Wow...20% of *all* internet usage? It took me a bit to undertsand that's what they meant. Anyway, I wonder how the US would compare to other countries if you were to include the bandwidth used while watching cable and satellite TV?

[Mike]

the headline contradicts the article.

"consumes" is different than "accounts for" -
accounts for 20% of peak bandwidth.

so, kinda misleading.

[Yuriy]

Does anyone know when, if at all ,streaming will have subtitles?

[s]

It includes subtitles now.

It's just not in every movie\show.

[beaglebot]

I think Yuiry is referring to closed captioning. I haven't come across anything foreign they had that didn't have subtitles

[Talking_biscuit]

Odd that these figures in the article seem to contradict the figures from the link Ethan Cooper posted (first comment) from http://www.digitalsociety.org/2010/10/world-broadband-comparisons-an-update/

Am I misreading something?

[Yuriy]

That is right, I was referring to the subtitles I meant closed captioning that most movies have. I need it mostly for films where British accents are common.

I doesn't seem to take up bandwith much, and there is still no option for it.

[Hbi2k]

@beaglebot - You mean other than their entire selection of anime as far as I can tell? That's a pretty big chunk of foreign material that doesn't offer subtitles, unless things have changed in a big way since the last time I checked.

[mith]

I believe it.

Rarely a day goes by where I don't use NF streaming. When I first started streaming a year ago I was afraid I was going to use too much of my data allowance. That has proven unwarranted.

Comcast allows us 250GB in data transfers each month. Month-to-date I have used 38GB. I used 33GB in September.

My service is 15Mbps downstream so I can and do watch NF HD streams. Even so, data consumption is not a problem.

[david]

Is this only residential usage? I would have thought business usage would account for a lot - VPNs, email, accessing business applications...