Over the next five years, global digital transformation will continue to have a significant impact on the demands and requirements of IP networks according to the Cisco Visual Networking Index Complete Forecast.
Top-level indicators include the projected increase in internet users (from 3.3 to 4.6 billion or 58% of the global population1), greater adoption of personal devices and machine-to-machine (M2M) connections (from 17.1 billion to 27.1 billion from 2016 – 2021), average broadband speed advances (from 27.5 Mbps to 53.0 Mbps), and more video viewing — from 73% to 82% of total IP traffic. Over the forecast period, global IP traffic is expected to increase three-fold reaching an annual run rate of 3.3 zettabytes by 2021, up from an annual run rate of 1.2 zettabytes in 2016.
For the first time in the 12 years of the forecast, M2M connections that support Internet of Things (IoT) applications are calculated to be more than half of the total 27.1 billion devices and connections and will account for five percent of global IP traffic by 2021.
Video will continue to dominate IP traffic and overall internet traffic growth, representing 80% of all Internet traffic by 2021, up from 67% in 2016. Globally, there will be nearly 1.9 billion internet video users (excluding mobile-only) by 2021, up from 1.4 billion in 2016. The world will reach three trillion internet video minutes per month by 2021, which is five million years of video per month, or about one million video minutes every second.
Emerging mediums such as live Internet video will increase 15-fold and reach 13% of internet video traffic by 2021, meaning more streaming of TV apps and personal live streaming on social networks. While live streaming video is reshaping today’s online entertainment patterns, virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) are also gaining traction. By 2021, VR/AR traffic will increase 20-fold and represent one percent of global entertainment traffic.
By 2021, more than half (56%) of connected flat panel TV sets will be 4K up from 15% in 2016, Installed/In-service 4K TV sets will increase from 85 million in 2016 to 663 million by 2021.
Cord-Cutting household traffic is 86% higher than average Internet households. A global cord-cutting household generates 117 GB per month in 2017, compared to 63 GB per month for an average internet household.
“As global digital transformation continues to impact billions of consumers and businesses, the network and security will be essential to support the future of the Internet,” said Yvette Kanouff, SVP and GM of Service Provider Business, Cisco.
“Driving network innovation with service providers will be key for Cisco to support the needs of their customers who want reliable, secure, and high quality connected experiences.”
