Want to See How Much Mobile Data Traffic is Video? (Hint: So Much!)

Video Represents 69% of Mobile Data Traffic, Growing to 79% by 2027 | Source: RapidTVNews

“The tenth edition of the Ericsson Mobility Report has revealed an almost 300-fold increase in mobile data traffic over that last decade, with long-term growth driven by both rising smartphone subscriptions and increasing average data volume per sub, fuelled primarily by video content.”

Source: Joseph O’Halloran, RapidTVNews

AT A GLANCE:

RapidTVNews writer Joseph O’Halloran does the yeoman’s work so that you don’t have to go page-by-page through the latest Ericsson Mobility Report and writing up a useful executive summary.

Not surprisingly, the “exponential” growth in watching movies, sports, TV programming, TikTok and cat videos on smartphones has tilted the scales from simple phone conversations and emailing to video consuming a majority of data traffic, rapidly approaching three-quarters. However, as is noted, a hidden pressure on the wireless network is a growing dependence on web services in the cloud with its unending demand for “instant” data. The growth rate is well into the double digits, quarter over quarter and year over year and it is not expected to slow down any time soon.

Ericsson expects 5G delivery to become the dominant method by 2027, supplanting 4G, which is expected to remain strong for the remainder of the decade. “Since 2011, the deployment of 4G LTE networks has been pivotal in generating 5.5 billion new smartphone connections worldwide, contributing to the market availability of more than 20,000 different 4G device models. The report indicates a much earlier technology lifecycle of 5G devices, with 5G handsets today accounting for 23% of global volumes, compared with 8% of 4G handsets at the corresponding point in its lifecycle.”

The tenth issue of the report also acts as a look-back at the previous decade in the wireless world. The report includes interesting comparisons with some predictions and how they turned out. In addition it offers data on regional usage, specialized types of wireless such as fixed and technologies on the horizon. Available here in PDF format, the report is well worth downloading for anyone interested the rapidly morphing wireless world.

Check out the whole story at RapidTVNews.