Video accounts for up to 60% of carrier data traffic, says report

Demand for video content remains the key driver of networks' bandwidth challenges, with video accounting for 40% to 60% of data traffic on wireless networks, says a third-quarter report from Bytemobile on the state of the mobile ecosystem.

Looking at anonymous traffic across the networks of its 125 carrier partners, the company found demand for video, in keeping with past quarters, on an "upward trajectory" and a change in users' behavior based on how optimized the network was for supporting viewing.

On average, it found that mobile subscribers consume their daily video intake in a single session, clicking through an average of 10 videos. In geographies were networks were not optimized for video, subscribers watched an average 60 seconds of each video, versus 90 seconds on optimized networks (CP: Skyfire turns from mobile browsers to optimizing video for operators). They also consumed twice as much video during off-peak hours than peak hours, when traffic was more congested.

As for devices driving traffic, all isn't equal. T-Mobile made a show yesterday (CP: C Spire Wireless, with the iPhone 4S coming, expands broadband coverage) of insisting — since Apple won't give it an iPhone — that its Android phones are just as good, if not better. What they're likely not doing, however, is driving as much traffic on the network as iPhones would. According to ByteMobile, 11% of iPhone users consume video content each day, compared to 7% of Android users.

It attributed the differences in screen size and user interface — and indeed, 17% of laptop users consumed video each day, compared to less than 1% of feature phone owners.

It also found that subscribers are looking for not just a easy experience but a high-quality one — requests for higher-quality video are on the rise, with demand for 360p and 480p content now driving the majority of video volume, and 720p coming into the picture.

How to keep subscribers happy? Prevent stalling, which hurts a video-viewing experience — and is occurring between 5 and 40% of the time. Video optimization technology, the company added, "reduces stalling by 30-50%."