World Cup, Call of Duty, Peaky Blinders spike UK online traffic
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Editor
| 30 December 2022
Traffic data from UK connectivity provider Zen Internet has found internet demand has continued to rise over the last year and prompted massive peaks in bandwidth consumption with yearly highs recorded in December 21% higher than a year ago.
zen 30Dec2022
Detailed analysis of the traffic revealed that gaming and streaming of live sport dominated consumption as 2022 saw no shortage of online entertainment, with new releases across gaming and streaming platforms, as well as live music events and sports matches providing the most popular forms of online entertainment. Zen’s traffic saw its all-time high for the year on 14 December at 20:30, coinciding with the end of the France versus Morocco World Cup semi-final football match. This reached a 21% increase on 2021’s highest peak.

The second highest peak was recorded on 19 October between 20:00 and 22:00 that night when Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare II became available to download for keen gamers, with a peak 17% higher than 2021’s. On the same day in October, the Premier League also drove spikes in network traffic with five matches being live streamed on Amazon Prime.

Football remained a fan favourite this year, with the Women’s Euro Final on 31 July seeing 17.4 million people watching on the BBC prompting a 7.46% dip in internet traffic, possibly brought about by people tuning into terrestrial TV to watch the Lionesses bring it home for England.

Conversely, the bank holiday weekend for Queen Elizabeth’s Jubilee between 2 and 5 5 June saw dips in internet traffic down 10% on average consumption, perhaps, suggested Zen, an indication of people out socialising in the sunshine as they enjoyed the double bank holiday weekend and connected with friends, family and neighbours at street festivals. Similarly, the announcement of the Queen’s death on 8 September saw another temporary dip to 39% lower than average internet usage between 18:30 – 19:30 on the BBC, coinciding with households tuning into terrestrial TV as the news officially broke.

“After another incredibly busy year for the internet, full of news stories, game releases, sporting events, and an explosion in online entertainment, it’s clear that households are relying more than ever before on their broadband,” said Zen Internet CEO Paul Stobart. “Demand for fast, reliable and high-quality connectivity is growing.”