How Much Data Does Online Gaming Use

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Online gaming is often blamed for using upwards a lot of data, and slowing down everyone else's connection because of how much speed it needs. In reality, though, online gaming uses much less Internet than an HD Netflix stream.

The exact corporeality of information will vary depending on the game, but playing a game online uses less information than many other common activities. The almost data-heavy games use somewhere in the realm of 300MB per 60 minutes, but many other games use 100MB per hour or less.

To put this in perspective, here's how an hr of data-intensive gaming compares to other online activities:

Activity	Data use
Streaming music	~100MB/hr
Online gaming	300MB/hour
Grouping video conferencing	800MB/hr
Streaming Hard disk drive Netflix	3GB/60 minutes

So you won't exist able to become as many hours of gaming out of your data as you would if you were streaming tunes, but it'southward really non a huge amount of information insufficiently. Keep in mind that 300MB/hr effigy is on the heavier end of the scale - well-nigh games won't even come close to using this much.

How much data does online gaming utilise per hour?

While it depends on the game, here are some estimate data figures for a few pop games:

Game	Data apply
Fortnite	50MB/hr
Overwatch	100MB/hour
Squad Fortress 2	80MB/hr
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	80MB/hr
League of Legends	50MB/hr
Counter Strike: Global Offensive	250MB/hr
DotA 2	120MB/hr

In contrast to playing a game, the actual process of installing a game – downloading it, patching information technology and installing extra content – can utilise up an extraordinary amount of data. Some game files can reach 90GB or more in size, though this is hardly the norm. The vast majority volition exist smaller if you play on consoles like the Nintendo Switch (most less than 10GB).

Here's the file size of some common games on PC:

Fortnite: 26GB
League of Legends: 8.2GB
Destiny 2: 105GB
Overwatch: 30GB
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare: 200+GB

Thankfully, most all NBN plans these days come with unlimited data so you shouldn't take to worry virtually how much data you're consuming from your online gaming.

Compare NBN plans today

Gaming itself uses very lilliputian information when you're really playing, somewhere between 20-100MB/60 minutes in most cases.

Streaming, on the other mitt, tin chew through loads and loads of information, all the manner up to almost 7GB at 4K resolution. This depends on a number of factors including:

Bitrate. Bitrate is a measure out of how much data is being processed every 2nd. A college bitrate means higher epitome quality, but also higher data usage.
Resolution. The better your resolution, the crisper your stream will look. Higher resolutions volition consume more data, assuming the picture quality remains unchanged.
Compression. Many streaming sites, such equally Twitch, will automatically compress your stream data and then that information technology doesn't need as much data. Uncompressed video can exist several times more data-intensive than the aforementioned video, compressed.

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Sam Baran is a writer for Finder, covering topics across the tech, telco and utilities sectors. They enjoy decrypting technical jargon and helping people compare complex products easily. When they aren't writing, you'll find Sam's caput buried in a volume or working on their latest brusk story. Sam has a Available of Advanced Scientific discipline from the University of Sydney.

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