Internet Traffic and Users to Skyrocket by 2021, Cisco Forecasts

The internet globally will continue to gain users and consume more bandwith in the coming years, according to the latest edition of Cisco’s Visual Networking Index (VNI) Global IP Traffic Forecast, covering the five-year period from 2016 to 2021.The most impressive number in the VNI forecast is 3.3 zettabytes—that’s the prediction for the total volume of IP traffic that will traverse the internet per year by 2021. That’s up from 1.2 zettabytes of traffic in 2016. There are a number of drivers behind the growth in global IP traffic, including internet of things (IoT) growth, increased use of ultra-high-definition TVs and faster WiFi speeds. In this slide show, eWEEK highlights some of the key findings in Cisco’s VNI Global IP Traffic Forecast for 2016-2021.

By 2021, Cisco’s Visual Networking Index forecasts that global IP traffic will reach an annual run rate of 3.3 zettabytes per year, up from 1.2 zettabytes of traffic in 2016.

As an increasing number of devices get connected, Cisco forecasts that by 2021 machine-to-machine (M2M) connections will represent more than half of all connections globally.

Different devices generate different volumes of IP traffic, with ultra-high-definition TVs being a leading consumer of bandwidth per month.

IPv6 is the next-generation IP addressing protocol and includes a 128-bit address space. Cisco predicts that by 2021, 61 percent of devices will be IPv6 capable.

From 2016 to 2021, usage of software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 44 percent, outpacing traditional WAN growth, which will have a CAGR of only 5 percent.

Cisco’s VNI Global IP Traffic Forecast predicts that global average WiFi speeds will double—from 18.2M bps in 2016 to 37.1M bps in 2021.

According to Cisco’s data, there were 3.3 billion global internet users in 2016. By 2021, that number will grow to 4.6 billion global internet users, a 7 percent compound annual growth rate, Cisco predicts.