How much data does streaming video use per hour?

Netflix says up to 0.3 GB an hour on Low, 0.7 GB on Medium, and on the High setting up to 1 GB for standard definition, 3 GB for HD and 7 GB for 4K. An hour of HD a day is therefore about 90 GB a month; an hour of standard definition about 30 GB.

How many hours of streaming is 10 GB?

Divide 10,000 MB by the rate. At Netflix's standard-definition rate (1,000 MB an hour) about 10 hours; on Medium (700 MB) about 14; in HD (3,000 MB) about 3.3 hours; in 4K under 1.5 hours. The page lists the hours a 1, 5, 10, 20 and 50 GB allowance lasts at whatever rate you choose.

How much data does a hotspot use?

Whatever the devices connected to it use — the hotspot itself adds nothing. Enter the hours a day and the rate of what you do on the laptop or tablet: browsing and email are tens of megabytes an hour, video calls hundreds, HD video thousands. Remember the laptop's own updates and backups, which can be gigabytes on their own.

Is 300 MB enough for an hour of video?

Only at the lowest quality. Netflix's Low setting is up to 0.3 GB — 300 MB — an hour, so 300 MB is roughly one hour on Low, about 25 minutes on Medium, and a few minutes in HD.

Does the calculator use GB or GiB?

Decimal GB, 1,000 MB each, because that is how carriers price plans and how Netflix quotes its rates. Some device settings report binary GiB (1,024 MiB); the difference is about 7%, so a plan that says 40 GB shows as roughly 37 GiB on such a screen.

Data Usage Calculator (Streaming, Hotspot & Mobile Data per Month)

How much data streaming or browsing uses per day and per month, and how long a data allowance lasts.

Inputs

Hours per day(h)

0 h24 h

What you're streaming

Data per hour (custom)(MB/h)

0 MB/h10,000 MB/h

Used when the activity is Custom — for music, video calls, gaming or hotspot browsing, take the figure from the app's own help page.

Days

1365

Include CalculateEveryday mark

Data over 30 days

45 GB

Working: 3 h × 500 MB/h × 30 days = 45,000 MB
Per day: 1,500 MB (1.5 GB)
Rate used: 500 MB per hour (custom)
Hours a 1 GB allowance lasts: 2 h
Hours a 5 GB allowance lasts: 10 h
Hours a 10 GB allowance lasts: 20 h
Hours a 20 GB allowance lasts: 40 h
Hours a 50 GB allowance lasts: 100 h

Decimal gigabytes (1 GB = 1,000 MB), the way plans are sold. Streaming apps adjust quality to the connection, so real use is usually below the 'up to' figure.

Use this calculator on your own site

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Shows a small CalculateEveryday bar, with a credit link under the calculator

What each Data Usage input means

Hours per day: Average hours a day of the activity. A daily average over the month works best, so weekends count.
What you're streaming: A Netflix quality preset, using Netflix's own published rates, or 'custom' to type a rate for anything else.
Data per hour (custom): Megabytes per hour for the custom option, taken from the app's help page or your phone's usage screen.
Days: Days in the billing period, usually 30.

Data Usage formula

data = hours a day × MB per hour × days · GB = MB ÷ 1,000 · hours an allowance lasts = allowance in MB ÷ MB per hour

\text{MB} = h_{\text{day}} \times \text{MB/h} \times \text{days}

Data use is a rate times a time. Streaming, calls and browsing each consume a fairly steady number of megabytes per hour, so multiply that rate by the hours a day, then by the days in the billing period. The rates that matter most are video: Netflix publishes its own — up to 0.3 GB an hour on the Low setting, 0.7 on Medium, and on High up to 1 GB for standard definition, 3 GB for HD and 7 GB for 4K — and those are the presets here. Phone plans are sold in decimal gigabytes (1 GB = 1,000 MB), so that is the conversion used. The page also turns the rate round to answer the other question people ask: how many hours a 1, 5, 10, 20 or 50 GB allowance will last at that rate.

Data Usage worked example

Three hours a day at 500 MB an hour is 1,500 MB, or 1.5 GB, a day. Over a 30-day month that is 45,000 MB = 45 GB — so a 40 GB plan runs out around day 27. At that rate a 10 GB allowance lasts 20 hours. Switching the preset to Netflix HD (3,000 MB an hour) turns the same three hours a day into 270 GB a month, which is why a hotspot plan and a TV series do not mix.

Where the Data Usage calculator can give the wrong answer

The presets are 'up to' figures. Streaming apps drop the quality when the connection is slow, so real use on a weak mobile signal is often well below the HD or 4K number — and on a fast connection with Auto quality it can reach it.
Only Netflix's figures are quoted, because Netflix publishes them. Other services, music apps, video calls and games have their own rates; take the number from that app's help page and enter it as a custom rate rather than assuming Netflix's.
Gigabytes here are decimal (1,000 MB), as on plan pricing. A phone's settings screen may count in binary gigabytes (1,024 MB), which makes the same usage read about 7% smaller.
Background use is not included: app updates, photo backups, email sync and ads all draw data outside the hours you enter. Leave a margin, or add a custom hour or two a day for it.
A hotspot passes on whatever the connected laptop does. A laptop's OS updates alone can be several gigabytes, which no per-hour rate predicts.

Spotted a mistake? Tell us

Data Usage FAQ

: Netflix says up to 0.3 GB an hour on Low, 0.7 GB on Medium, and on the High setting up to 1 GB for standard definition, 3 GB for HD and 7 GB for 4K. An hour of HD a day is therefore about 90 GB a month; an hour of standard definition about 30 GB.
: Divide 10,000 MB by the rate. At Netflix's standard-definition rate (1,000 MB an hour) about 10 hours; on Medium (700 MB) about 14; in HD (3,000 MB) about 3.3 hours; in 4K under 1.5 hours. The page lists the hours a 1, 5, 10, 20 and 50 GB allowance lasts at whatever rate you choose.
: Whatever the devices connected to it use — the hotspot itself adds nothing. Enter the hours a day and the rate of what you do on the laptop or tablet: browsing and email are tens of megabytes an hour, video calls hundreds, HD video thousands. Remember the laptop's own updates and backups, which can be gigabytes on their own.
: Only at the lowest quality. Netflix's Low setting is up to 0.3 GB — 300 MB — an hour, so 300 MB is roughly one hour on Low, about 25 minutes on Medium, and a few minutes in HD.
: Decimal GB, 1,000 MB each, because that is how carriers price plans and how Netflix quotes its rates. Some device settings report binary GiB (1,024 MiB); the difference is about 7%, so a plan that says 40 GB shows as roughly 37 GiB on such a screen.