Estimate Your Usage
Hours Spent Online
In 2014-2015, information was collected in Australia on the average number of hours spent online for personal use in a typical week. The average was discovered at 10 hours. Those at 15-17 age group had the highest mean hours (18 hours per week), and 45-54 and 65+ age groups had the lowest mean hours, (7 hours per week). Your individual usage will vary and be different to these average times discovered during the census. Please keep in mind, given the growth of video streaming services like Netflix, Stan, Presto and Foxtel Go in the Australian marketplace, it is likely that these figures have risen since 2015 and will continue to rise in the future.
Web Browsing
Assuming an average web site is around 2.5MB in size. If all you did was browsing web sites, you might consume 6.5GB per month if all you did was browse websites. This amount is per-person within the household, with a four person household, this would be 26GB per month.
The 2.5MB size estimate does not include video streaming or image heavy websites, (EG, Youtube/Facebook). Please refer to the section below for “streaming” sites that contain streamed media.
How much data does Youtube Use?
Starting at 100MB per hour.
An hour of browsing youtube at a lower quality (480p) would use 240MB, however streaming at a higher quality (1080p), will consume 744MB per hour. See the table below for full information on Youtube data consumption.
| YouTube Usage | 240p | 360p | 480p | 720p | 1080p |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Per min. | 1.6MB | 2.66MB | 4MB | 7.4MB | 12.4MB |
| Per hour | 100MB | 160MB | 240MB | 450MB | 750MB |
How much data does Netflix Use?
Starting at 300MB per hour.
Netflix has three quality settings for streaming.
- Low: 300MB per hour
- Medium: 700MB per hour
- High: 3GB per hour for HD, 7GB per hour for 4K
The type of setting you will be using is based on whether or not you have purchased the HD package, (if you have not purchase it, it will not be available). In addition to this, Netflix by default will “auto” select the highest quality setting possible based on your connection and device.
How much data does Spotify use?
Spotify’s data usage depends on whether you are subscribed on the free tier, or you pay for premium membership.
Generally, on the free tier you stream at 160kbps, which is roughly 72MB per hour.
On the premium tier, you will stream music at 320kbps, roughly 144MB per hour.
How much data does Stan use?
Stan will reportedly consume around:
- 2.89 GB per hour of HD streaming (default settings)
- 1.13 GB per hour on medium quality
- 0.57 GB per hour on low quality
Conclusion
The amount of data you require depends on what type of media you consume on the internet, and how many hours you spent per week online.
To promote simplicity in choosing your plan and overall customer satisfaction, Next Business Telecom now offers all new nbn plans with unlimited data usage per month. This means unlimited browsing and streaming without having to estimate your usage, pay excess fees or suffer speed shaping. If you would like to switch from our old fixed data nbn plans to an unlimited plan, simply contact our friendly customer support team today to discuss your options.
Selecting a suitable nbn speed tier can be a little more tricky. As a general rule, it could be based on how many people are using the internet at your peak times, and what sort of activities you will be performing (such as HD streaming). When combining these things together you can estimate your “peak bit rate” or throughput.
For example, if you occasionally have two or more people streaming HD content at the same time, you may want to consider choosing a higher speed tier to mitigate potential congestion.
If you would further advice and information, simply contact our friendly sales team today!