Netflix Movies Online 2014: Company Accounts for More Than a Third Of North America's Internet Streaming
The traffic that Netflix generates has grown substantially over the years as it now accounts for more than 34 percent of the wired downloads on the Internet in North America.
Time Magazine reported that based on findings by Sandvine, a research firm, Netflix's share of the Internet was already at 31.6 percent in the second half of 2013 while no other application came close except for YouTub with 13.19 percent.
In terms of mobile networks in North America, Netflix only accounts for a mere 4.55 percent where it sits in eighth place while YouTube reigns supreme with 17.26 percent of the traffic.
The U.S. is finding that more people are opting to make Internet-based video sites their primary source of entertainment rather than paying for monthly television packages that can be costly.
According to Time, these cord-cutters consume roughly 212GB of data per month, which is seven times more than the average Internet user because they stream 100 hours of video a month on average.
As a result of the growth in Internet-based entertainment, file sharing such as video and music piracy has decreased to 8.3 percent of traffic. Six years ago, file sharing made up 31 percent.
During the last six months, Netflix's subscriber count grew by 15 percent, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The Huffington Post reported that two million people in the U.S. subscribed to Netflix between January and March this year, which brought the company's total subscribers to 35.67 million.
However, Netflix's popularity has only increased the concerns of cable and network providers, which also include streaming packages to their services. Some companies including Comcast and Verizon have successfully gotten Netflix to pay to interconnect with their networks, the Journal reported.
The interconnection helped with bandwidth and streaming problems as it allowed big networks to share traffic more efficiently.