SAN JOSE, CA – Five years from now, more members of the global population will use mobile phones (5.5 billion) than bank accounts (5.4 billion), running water (5.3 billion), or landlines (2.9 billion), predicts a new report from Cisco.
According to the Cisco Visual Networking Index Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast (2016 to 2021), mobile data traffic will increase seven-fold by 2021, driven by strong growth in mobile users, smartphones and Internet of Things (IoT) connections as well as network speed improvements and mobile video consumption.
The explosion of mobile applications and adoption of mobile connectivity by end users is fueling the growth of 4G, soon to be followed by 5G growth as large-scale deployments of 5G infrastructures begin by 2020, reads the report. Cisco forecasts that 5G will account for 1.5% of total mobile data traffic by 2021, and will generate 4.7 times more traffic than the average 4G connection and 10.7 times more traffic than the average 3G connection.
In Canada, mobile data traffic is expected to grow 5-fold from 2016 to 2021, a compound annual growth rate of 36%, and grow two times faster than fixed IP traffic. Mobile data traffic will also account for 7% of Canadian fixed and mobile data traffic by 2021, up from 4% in 2016.
Other highlights from the report include:
– Mobile data traffic will represent 20% of total IP traffic by 2021, up from just 8% of total IP traffic in 2016.
– By 2021, there will be nearly 12 billion mobile-connected devices and 1.5 mobile devices per capita (up from 8 billion and 1.1 per capita in 2016), including M2M modules.
– Mobile network connection speeds will increase threefold from 6.8 Mbps in 2016 to 20.4 Mbps by 2021.
– Machine-to-machine (M2M) connections will represent 29% (3.3 billion) of total mobile connections, up from 5% (780 million) in 2016. M2M will be the fastest growing mobile connection type as global IoT applications continue to gain traction in consumer and business environments.
– 4G will support 58% of total mobile connections by 2021, up from 26% in 2016, and will account for 79% of total mobile data traffic.
– The total number of smartphones (including phablets) will be over 50% of global devices and connections will top 6.2 billion, up from 3.6 billion in 2016.
“With the proliferation of IoT, live mobile video, augmented and virtual reality applications, and more innovative experiences for consumer and business users alike, 5G technology will have significant relevance not just for mobility but rather for networking as a whole,” said Cisco VP of service provider marketing Doug Webster, in the report’s news release. “As a result, broader and more extensive architectural transformations involving programmability and automation will also be needed to support the capabilities 5G enables, and to address not just today’s demands but also the extensive possibilities on the horizon.”
