Virgin Media has revealed that Tuesday 10 November saw its busiest day on record for internet traffic across its network.
The surge in broadband data consumption has been partly driven by the launch of the Xbox Series X/S consoles, the first of the next-gen consoles to launch, with PlayStation 5 arriving on Thursday 19 November.
This increase was also linked to numerous popular game releases and updates. This included the release of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (60GB and a day one update of 8GB); a Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Update (30-65GB); the pre-download of Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War (85-130GB) and a Destiny 2: Blue Light update (65GB).
In total, 108 Petabytes of data was consumed on Tuesday 10 November – an average of more than 20GB per customer. At the peak of recorded traffic, the equivalent of 48 Assassin’s Creed Valhalla games were being downloaded every second.
The importance and reliance on connectivity throughout the Covid-19 pandemic also contributed to the record day, with people continuing to work remotely and spending more time at home streaming video content, playing games online and video calling friends and family.
Virgin Media’s previous busiest ever day of network traffic was Thursday 11 June, which coincided with the launch of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Season 4.
Jeanie York, Chief Technology and Information Officer at Virgin Media, said:
“Keeping the country connected remains a top priority for Virgin Media. We’ve seen previous network traffic records smashed this year as a result of Covid-19 with our customers spending more time at home working, streaming, gaming, scrolling and virtually staying in touch with friends and family. We remain focused on supporting our customers with fast, robust connectivity at a time when these connections have never been more important to our lives.”
Virgin Media anticipates another busy week of network traffic ahead, with Amazon Prime Video streaming the Autumn Nations Cup 2020 this weekend as well as the launch of PlayStation 5 next Thursday.
tl;dr
- Tuesday 10 November was Virgin Media’s busiest day of broadband traffic on record – 30% higher than October’s average
- This was linked to the launch of Xbox Series X/S consoles and games including Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Destiny 2 Blue Light, a Call of Duty: Modern Warfare update and pre-download of Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
- The continued impact of Covid-19 with more people remote working, online gaming and video streaming also contributed to the surge in broadband data consumption
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