Only those with expensive unlimited plan can afford to ignore how much mobile data is consumed every month. It is likely video streaming that is responsible for hovering up your monthly data allowance. With 300 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute, the video sharing site continues to be the world’s most popular video platform, making it unsurprising how easy it is to burn through your data allotment with it.
Does watching YouTube videos on the move use mobile data?
Almost everything you do on your smartphone uses data when the device is not connected to Wi-Fi.
This includes using messaging apps such as WhatsApp, streaming music on Spotify, browsing social media sites and the web, and watching videos on YouTube.
There is a clever trick to Watching YouTube videos while mobile more economically.
Start by opening the YouTube app, click on your profile picture – if you are logged in using your Google account.
Next, tap on Settings > General, then tap on the slider at the far end of Limit mobile data usage to the right to turn on the feature.
How much data does watching YouTube while mobile use?
YouTube’s data usage depends on the quality of the video stream.
YouTube’s mobile app offers multiple levels of quality, from the pixelated 144p to the supreme 4K quality 2160p.
For reference, 480p is considered standard definition. 1080p is technically HD (High Definition), which is usually the default setting on YouTube.
4K video is not as widespread, but many channels are increasingly supporting 4K content.
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Estimates for the quantity of data each of these uses is an inexact science.
Consequently, this is is a rough approximation and real-world results can vary.
YouTube’s recommended bitrates for streaming page contains information on video bitrates for various quality options.
These will be used as a baseline, although not every video is identical.
For standard quality 480p video, YouTube recommends a bitrate between 500 and 2,000Kbps, averaging to 1,250Kbps (kilobits per second).
1,250Kbps divided by 1,000 equates to 1.25Mbps (megabits per second).
Since there are eight bits in one byte, 1.25Mpbs divided by eight equals approximately 0.156 megabytes per second of video.
Multiplying this by 60 seconds means a 480p YouTube video uses about 9.375MB of data per minute on YouTube.
9.375MB per minute times 60 minutes in an hour is roughly 562.5MB of data per hour of YouTube streaming at 480p.
Video quality comparison for YouTube data usage:
Applying this calculation to YouTube’s other quality options results in the following estimates for hourly data usage.
Note that for 720p quality and above, YouTube also supports videos at 60FPS (frames per second) instead of the standard 30FPS.
Higher FPS means a better quality video and an unsurprisingly commensurate increase in data usage.
240p: 225MB per hour
360p: 315MB per hour
480p: 562.5MB per hour
720p at 30FPS: 1237.5MB (1.24GB) per hour
720p at 60FPS: 1856.25MB (1.86GB) per hour
1080p at 30FPS: 2.03GB per hour
1080p at 60FPS: 3.04GB per hour
1440p (2K) at 30FPS: 4.28GB per hour
1440p (2K) at 60FPS: 6.08GB per hour
2160p (4K) at 30FPS: 10.58GB per hour
2160p (4K) at 60FPS: 15.98GB per hour
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