Global data traffic, selected years

The COVID-19 pandemic had a dramatic impact on Internet traffic, as most activities increasingly took place online. Global Internet bandwidth use rose by 35 per cent in 2020, a substantial increase over the 26 per cent growth of the previous year. Driven largely by the response to the pandemic, this represented the largest one-year increase since 2013. Although from March 2020 such traffic patterns shifted and volumes surged, the Internet has proven remarkably resilient in coping with the sudden changes associated with the pandemic. Many network operators have been accelerating plans to add capacity to stay ahead of demand (TeleGeography, 2021a). According to Ericsson (2020), mobile network data traffic increased by 50 per cent between the third quarter (Q3) of 2019 and Q3 2020. Global data traffic reached 180 and 230 exabytes per month in 2019 and 2020, respectively (figure I. 9). By 2026, this volume is forecast to more than triple, to reach up to 780 exabytes per month. Fixed data traffic accounted for almost three quarters of all data traffic in 2019. However, with the increasing number of mobile devices and IoT, data traffic by mobile broadband is expected to grow faster and reach almost one third of the total data volume in 2026. By other accounts, in 2020, 64. 2 zettabytes of data were created or replicated, defying the systemic downward pressure asserted by the pandemic on many industries, and its impact will be felt for several years. It is estimated that the amount of digital data created over the next five years will be more than twice the amount created since the advent of digital storage. Global data creation and replication will experience a compound annual growth of 23 per cent in the 2020–2025 forecast (IDC, 2021a)