If you’re someone who likes to stream movies or TV shows on the go, you might be wondering how much cellular data Netflix uses. In this post, we’ll go over the different settings available on the Netflix application and how much data each one uses.
First, it’s important to note that the Netflix application allows you to change the quality of your videos and movies. The higher the quality, the more data it will use. You can set your default data and quality settings to be automatic, or you can manually select from the following options:
– Off (stream only over Wi-Fi)
– Low (1 gig of data per 4 hours of video playback)
– Medium (1 gig of data per 2 hours of video playback)
– High (1 gig of data per 1 hour of video playback)
– Unlimited (not recommended without an unlimited data plan)
To test each setting, the author of the post played the first episode of White Collar for 30 minutes on each setting and reset the data statistics between each test.
On the unlimited and high settings, it was found that you’ll use about 1 gigabyte of data per 1.5 hours of video playback. This means that streaming a movie like The Avengers will take up about 2 gigs of data, while streaming a 45-minute TV show like White Collar will take about half a gig of data. Streaming a 23-minute TV show like The Office will take up about 200 megabytes of data per show.
Interestingly, the medium setting used the same amount of data as the high and unlimited settings. This means that you’ll also use about 1 gigabyte of data per 1.5 hours of video playback on this setting.
However, the low setting used significantly less data – only 105 megabytes of data for 30 minutes of streaming. This equates to about 1 gig of data per 5 hours of video playback. So, if you’re looking to save on cellular data, using the low setting can make a big difference.
Overall, if you have to watch Netflix on the go, we recommend turning on the low setting to save on data and watch as much video content as possible without going over your limit.