Aussies downloaded 2.6 million terabytes in 3 months - which actually isn't a lot

Alex Choros - Managing Editor + Group Telco Editor

Last updated 05 April 2017

Australians downloaded 2.6 million terabytes of data in the last three months of 2016 over broadband connections, according to the Australian Bureau of Statics' latest Internet Activity Survey. While that might sound like a lot of data, on average its works out to be about 62GB per each of Australia's 13.5 million internet subscribers.

62GB per subscriber is a 50.8% increase in downloads when compared to the last three months of 2015, but for all intents and purposes, a quite a small amount. For reference, it's 20 hours of HD Netflix, 8 hours of 4K Netflix, or just one AAA game download. Considering an "internet subscriber" can refer to an entire household rather than just one person, that's even fewer gigabytes per head.

So why aren't we downloading more? One possible explanation is that that just 2% of Australian internet subscribers have connections with an advertised speed of 100Mbps or faster. 56% are on speeds over 25Mbps, and 25% are still on connections with speed 8Mbps and 24Mbps.

Other key findings from the survey include the following:

In the last 12 months, fibre users have more than doubled
In the last 12 months, cable growth has been stagnant
In the last 12 months, ADSL subscriber have dropped over 6%
In the last 12 months, internet subscribers have grown 4.7%

In terms of mobile, the amount of data downloaded via handsets over the same period of time was 146,050 terabytes, which equates to a 61% increase over the last three months of 2015. This averages out to be just under 2GB per mobile phone user.

While averages aren't exactly a great way to pick a broadband or mobile plan - I comfortably go through at least 10GB on my phone, whereas if you're getting a plan for your kid, you might not want to give them any more than 1GB a month - but can they serve as good indicator at the minimum most people will want to take up. If you need help working out what size phone or broadband plan to take, check out our broadband and mobile data usage guides.

Download processing on laptop image from ShutterStock.

Alex Choros

Managing Editor + Group Telco Editor | X | Instagram | Threads | LinkedIn

Alex Choros is the Managing Editor of WhistleOut Australia and an award-winning journalist. He's been writing about consumer technology for over a decade and is an expert on the Australian telco sector, to the point where he knows far too many phone and internet plans by heart. In addition to leading the WhistleOut editorial team, Alex is responsible for ruining the office Sonos with his troubled taste in music.

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