How much does 1gb of data last on mobile

When signing up for any Mobile data package the question always arises - how many gigabytes to use the SIM plan? Especially if we are talking about mobile data.

There is no universal answer - it depends on your needs and how carefully you use the Internet data on your mobile device.

In this article we will answer frequently asked questions: what is a megabyte, is 1gb data enough for a few months, is there enough data to communicate in Whatsapp and watch videos online, and other questions...

Is 1GB enough for a month?

Quick answer is: Yes, if you use only messengers and text messages.

But don't forget that your phone consumes the Internet data in the background. Some examples:

• Navigation map updates,
• App background minor updates,
• System updates for Android / iOS.

These functions alone can "eat up" from 100mb per month. Therefore, in a strong economy, do not forget to turn off all the auto-updates and checks not through the Wi-fi network.

How many MB are in 1 GB?

One GB contains 1024 MB. The most common number cited is 1000 MB, which is not too far from the truth. Your mobile carrier's data plan includes a certain number of megabytes of data available for download.

How much mobile data is spent on different activities

It's worth realizing that regardless of activity, Internet usage is always different. It depends on the screen size of your device, your mobile operator and even your internet speed. The figures given here are approximate, but they will help to guide you. If necessary, you can always check how much data a particular application consumes on your own.

Using social networks and messengers

Data consumption directly depends on what you do in the social network. For example, if you are browsing through a page with a large number of media files (videos, pictures, gif animation), the internet data consumption will be high.

If you watch films and TV series via social networks, your consumption will depend on the quality and duration of the video. It may be up to several GB when watching big videos in high quality.

If you're just messaging and occasionally sending pictures, the consumption will rarely exceed 100 MB per month. If you add voice and video messages to this, consumption goes up to 500 MB. Of course, it all depends on how often you communicate, and in a month the consumption can even reach 1GB.

You can save a lot of data, if you disable automatic downloading of pictures and videos via mobile Internet or turn on Data saver.

In this case, 1GB of data will be enough even for more than a month.

How long will 1gb of data last on Youtube?

Watching videos is the most expensive way of surfing the Internet. Watching an hour of HD video can consume up to 1GB of your Internet time or more depending on the resource. Higher formats like 4K can consume as much as 8GB per hour.

How long will 1Gb of mobile data last on Youtube? Approximate data consumption per minute depending on quality (YouTube):

If you watch live broadcasts, Live videos, streams, then the consumption will be significantly higher than when watching ordinary videos.

However, do not forget that it strongly depends on the speed of your Internet, the size of the screen and many other factors.

The "Data saver" mode and reducing the quality of the video clip helps to save megabytes of Internet.

GPS navigation and maps

The average consumption of Google Maps - 5-10 MB per hour. With active use - search for places, turn on the voice navigator, the consumption increases, but rarely exceeds 20 MB.

When switching the map to "satellite photos" or "hybrid" mode it spends from 500kb to 1 MB of data.

The Internet data is not used during GPS operation, however it may be consumed to improve navigation accuracy. If you want to save money - go to the settings of your navigator, and check the use "only on Wi-Fi".

If you have not downloaded maps in advance - then the consumption may increase a little more, not more than 10 MB.

Video / audio calls via Telegram, WhatsApp, Skype, etc.

Messengers "consume" less data than other services - less than 1 MB per minute for an audio call.

Skype and Discord - from 1.5 MB and more, depending on the number of users in the call.

Also, Discord consumes about 45 mb per hour just running in the background on your PC. The phone version is more economical. The average "cost" of a voice call is 100-200 MB per hour.

At the moment, the most "economical" messenger is Telegram, followed by WhatsApp.

Video calls and broadcasts consume the same amount of data as watching videos. Average consumption in quality below 720p is 400 MB per hour. Long streams in high quality can consume dozens of gigabytes.

How long does 1Gb of data last on a Whatsapp app on Android / iOS?

Whatsapp consumes about 50 MB per 10 minutes of conversation in video and audio mode. Accordingly, 1 hour of conversation = 300 - 400 MB of data. Accordingly, 1 GB of data is enough for 2.5 hours of video calls.

You need to keep these figures in mind in order not to exceed your mobile operator SIM plans and not to consume all the data at once.

We advise you not to use Whatsapp video calls regularly if you use mobile data only. But if you use Wi-Fi, obviously it doesn't matter how long 1Gb of data lasts.

In data-saving mode, the data isn't much different. But at the moment there is no clear info on this. We will test Whatsapp and update this article.

Among other things, 1 GB of data may not be enough if you actively send files through Whatsapp: pictures, videos and audio files. So always check the size of the attachments you send.

Listening to music

Data consumption depends on the service you use. If you listen to playlists via YouTube, then your data consumption will be the same as when watching a video.

Legitimate services like Spotify, Google Play music, etc. consume significantly less data, and thanks to the music cache saving feature, you can keep your Internet usage to a minimum. However, it is important to disable cache saving from mobile data.

The most "budget-friendly" option is Spotify. At low quality music consumption is only 50 MB per hour, at medium quality (160kbps) - 72 MB per hour. At high quality (320 kbps) the consumption is 115 MB per hour.

For Google Play music the difference is not too big - 85 MB for normal quality and 145 MB of data consumption for high quality.

To Sum up: Is 1GB of data enough for you?

FAQ

How to see how much data you're using on your Android

Step 1. Open "Settings" on Android;

Step 2. Go to "Connections";

Step 3. Select the "Data usage" section;

Via this section, you can see how much mobile data you spent over the last month.

Thanks to special buttons you can include or not to include Wi-Fi or mobile data in the calculation.

The section "charging period and limit" allows you to set the number, from which the spent data is counted. If your tariff is set to zero on the 5th of each month, then set the billing to the 5th.

To check how much data was consumed by each individual app, tap on the "Mobile data usage" item under the SIM card on which you have an Internet package connected.

How to set a mobile data limit

To set a limit, go to "Data usage" again and tap on "Billing cycle and data warning".

You'll have the "data warning" option available - you can turn it on and then you'll be notified the moment you've used up a certain amount of data.

If you want to set a limit, tap on "Data warning" and set a limit.

When this data is consumed, the mobile data will be turned off.

What does your data usage rate depend on?

Everything - your device, the quality of the video you watch, the number of hours you spend online.

How much faster your data usage will be if your phone is sharing the Internet with others.

If you share the mobile data, it is spent exactly as much as the end user spends. If he's browsing social networks, your phone uses the same amount of data as you would if you were using social networks. No more, no less

If your plan includes "unlimited", will you spend gigabytes if you give Internet access to another device?

Depends on your plans package and what you are sharing the internet with. For example, if you are sharing the Internet from your phone to your laptop - Gigabytes will be spent regardless of your unlimited data plan.

If you're sharing on another phone - the speed will be greatly reduced, but the limit, for example on the social networks will be valid.

However, some tariff packages include conditions such as "no-limit when using 4G". In this case, any download will spend gigabytes, no matter on your PC or mobile device.