As the digital world expands at an astounding pace, with over 5,200 exabytes of traffic projected for 2024, understanding the sources and behaviors behind this torrent of data is crucial for anyone looking to navigate the modern online landscape.
Key Takeaways
- Global internet traffic averaged 3,256 exabytes per month in Q2 2023, marking a 15% YoY increase
- Fixed broadband accounted for 52% of global IP traffic in 2022, totaling 2,100 EB annually
- Mobile data traffic grew to 923 EB in 2022, representing 28% of total IP traffic worldwide
- Asia-Pacific generated 52% of global internet traffic in 2023, totaling 2,428 EB annually
- North America accounted for 22% of world internet traffic in 2022, with 916 EB yearly
- Europe contributed 18% of global web traffic in 2023, peaking at 840 EB per year
- Mobile devices drove 59% of global web traffic in 2023, surpassing desktop's 40%
- Desktop usage fell to 41% of total traffic worldwide in Q4 2023
- Tablet traffic share stabilized at 4% globally in 2023
- Search engines referred 53% of all website traffic globally in 2023
- Direct traffic made up 28% of web visits worldwide in Q3 2023
- Social media drove 12% of global traffic referrals in 2023, led by Facebook at 4%
- YouTube.com was the most visited website globally with 11.5 billion monthly visits in Dec 2023
- Google.com received 8.3 billion monthly visits worldwide in Dec 2023
- Facebook.com had 7.9 billion visits per month globally in Dec 2023
Global internet traffic is exploding, driven largely by video streaming on mobile devices.
Global Traffic Volume
- Global internet traffic averaged 3,256 exabytes per month in Q2 2023, marking a 15% YoY increase
- Fixed broadband accounted for 52% of global IP traffic in 2022, totaling 2,100 EB annually
- Mobile data traffic grew to 923 EB in 2022, representing 28% of total IP traffic worldwide
- Wi-Fi offload carried 58% of mobile data traffic globally in 2022, equating to 535 EB
- Video streaming comprised 82% of global internet traffic in 2023, driven by platforms like Netflix and YouTube
- Global internet traffic hit 4,666 EB per year in 2023, with peak usage during evenings at 150% of average
- IPv6 traffic share reached 39% of global internet traffic by end of 2023
- HTTPS encrypted 88% of web page loads worldwide in December 2023
- Average global website page load time was 2.5 seconds in 2023, impacting 53% bounce rate
- Internet traffic during COVID-19 peaked at 205 Tbps globally in March 2020
- Global internet traffic volume surged to 5,200 EB annually in 2024 forecast
- Peak global traffic hit 250 Tbps during 2023 World Cup events
- HTTP/2 protocol usage reached 45% of global web traffic in 2023
- Content Delivery Networks handled 75% of global video traffic in 2023
- Gaming traffic grew 30% YoY to 120 EB globally in 2023
Global Traffic Volume Interpretation
The internet is now a planet-sized, high-definition television that we all compulsively feed with our evenings, our phones, and our data, which it politely encrypts and then struggles to deliver without making half of us impatiently leave.
Mobile vs Desktop
- Mobile devices drove 59% of global web traffic in 2023, surpassing desktop's 40%
- Desktop usage fell to 41% of total traffic worldwide in Q4 2023
- Tablet traffic share stabilized at 4% globally in 2023
- Android devices generated 72% of mobile web traffic in 2023, iOS 27%
- In the US, mobile traffic hit 62% of total web visits in 2023
- Global mobile app traffic overtook web traffic at 60% share in 2023
- 55% of web traffic from smartphones in Europe during 2023, desktop 44%
- Voice search drove 20% of mobile traffic queries in 2023 globally
- AMP pages boosted mobile traffic speed by 30% for news sites in 2023
- 68% of mobile users abandon sites loading over 3 seconds in 2023
- Mobile traffic in India hit 70% of total web visits in 2023
- Desktop still dominated at 52% in enterprise traffic globally 2023
- Wearables contributed 1.5% to total device traffic in 2023
- iOS mobile web traffic share was 25% globally in 2023
- 4G networks carried 55% of mobile traffic worldwide 2023
- Chrome browser dominated mobile at 65% traffic share in 2023
- Safari held 30% iOS traffic share globally 2023
- Mobile video consumption peaked at 70% of traffic in 2023
- Bounce rate on mobile sites averaged 50% vs 40% desktop in 2023
Mobile vs Desktop Interpretation
The smartphone has officially dethroned the desktop as the world's primary window to the web, proving that our pockets now hold more global traffic than our desks, yet still demand patience and speed.
Popular Websites
- YouTube.com was the most visited website globally with 11.5 billion monthly visits in Dec 2023
- Google.com received 8.3 billion monthly visits worldwide in Dec 2023
- Facebook.com had 7.9 billion visits per month globally in Dec 2023
- Instagram.com attracted 6.8 billion monthly visits in Dec 2023 worldwide
- Wikipedia.org saw 6.2 billion visits monthly in Dec 2023 globally
- Twitter.com (X.com) generated 5.4 billion visits per month in Dec 2023
- TikTok.com reached 4.7 billion monthly visits worldwide in Dec 2023
- Baidu.com topped China with 3.2 billion visits monthly in Dec 2023
- Yandex.ru led Russia with 1.8 billion monthly visits in Dec 2023
- Amazon.com had 2.9 billion global visits monthly in Dec 2023
- Netflix.com peaked at 1.2 billion monthly visits globally Dec 2023
- Reddit.com saw 3.1 billion visits monthly worldwide Dec 2023
- Live.com (Outlook) had 1.5 billion visits per month Dec 2023
- Weather.com attracted 1.8 billion global visits monthly 2023
- Yahoo.com maintained 2.2 billion monthly visits Dec 2023
- Pornhub.com generated 3.5 billion visits monthly globally 2023
- Xvideos.com led adult category with 4.1 billion visits Dec 2023
- Taobao.com topped e-com in China at 2.8 billion visits 2023
- VK.com had 1.4 billion visits in Russia monthly 2023
Popular Websites Interpretation
In a world where humanity is allegedly drowning in misinformation, isolation, and fleeting pleasures, the monthly traffic report reveals our true digital obsessions: after watching 11.5 billion videos on YouTube, we mostly check Google for what we just saw, argue about it on social media, secretly explore our vices, and, blessedly, still look up facts on Wikipedia about 6.2 billion times a month.
Regional Breakdowns
- Asia-Pacific generated 52% of global internet traffic in 2023, totaling 2,428 EB annually
- North America accounted for 22% of world internet traffic in 2022, with 916 EB yearly
- Europe contributed 18% of global web traffic in 2023, peaking at 840 EB per year
- Latin America saw 7% of global traffic share in 2023, equating to 326 EB annually
- Middle East and Africa region had 5% global traffic in 2022, growing 25% YoY to 208 EB
- China alone generated 25% of global internet traffic in 2023, over 1,166 EB yearly
- US internet traffic reached 750 EB in 2023, 18% of global total
- India contributed 4.5% of world traffic in 2023, surging 35% YoY to 210 EB
- Brazil's web traffic hit 120 EB in 2023, 2.6% global share with 30% mobile dominance
- UK's monthly internet traffic averaged 85 EB in 2023, up 12% from 2022
- Latin America mobile traffic exploded 40% YoY to 450 EB in 2023
- Southeast Asia generated 15% global traffic, 700 EB yearly in 2023
- Germany's web traffic averaged 70 EB monthly in 2023
- Japan's internet usage hit 55 EB monthly, 90% mobile in 2023
- South Africa's traffic share rose to 1.2% globally, 56 EB yearly in 2023
- Mexico contributed 85 EB annually to global traffic in 2023
- Australia's monthly web traffic reached 45 EB in 2023
- France saw 60 EB monthly traffic, up 10% YoY in 2023
Regional Breakdowns Interpretation
The data paints a clear picture: while North America and Europe remain digital powerhouses, the future of the internet is being written in Asia-Pacific, led by China's colossal traffic, with explosive growth in mobile-first regions like India and Southeast Asia rapidly reshaping the global landscape.
Traffic Sources
- Search engines referred 53% of all website traffic globally in 2023
- Direct traffic made up 28% of web visits worldwide in Q3 2023
- Social media drove 12% of global traffic referrals in 2023, led by Facebook at 4%
- Email marketing contributed 5% to total web traffic in 2023 globally
- Referrals from other sites accounted for 9% of traffic worldwide in 2023
- Google organic search sent 45% of search traffic to websites in 2023
- YouTube referrals grew to 3.2% of total traffic share in 2023
- Paid search (PPC) generated 15% of search referrals globally in 2023
- Organic social traffic from Instagram hit 2.1% globally in 2023
- Google Images referred 1.8% of web traffic in 2023 worldwide
- Direct visits from bookmarks were 2% of total traffic in 2023
- Facebook drove 7.5% of social traffic referrals to e-commerce sites in 2023
- Social media referrals grew to 14% of total traffic in 2023
- Google Discover sent 4% of mobile traffic referrals in 2023
- Pinterest referrals hit 2.5% globally for visual sites 2023
- Newsletters drove 3% email traffic to publishers in 2023
- Reddit referrals increased 50% YoY to 1.2% total in 2023
- LinkedIn contributed 1.5% B2B traffic referrals 2023
- WhatsApp links referred 0.8% web traffic globally 2023
- TikTok drove 2.8% referral traffic to e-com in 2023
- Bing search share was 6% of total search traffic 2023
Traffic Sources Interpretation
In 2023, despite the relentless digital chatter, the internet’s traffic report quietly whispered that over half of all visitors still politely knocked on the front door via search engines, proving that when humans want something, they’re essentially just asking Google.
Sources & References
- Reference 1STATISTAstatista.comVisit source
- Reference 2CISCOcisco.comVisit source
- Reference 3SANDVINEsandvine.comVisit source
- Reference 4RADARradar.cloudflare.comVisit source
- Reference 5W3TECHSw3techs.comVisit source
- Reference 6HTTPARCHIVEhttparchive.orgVisit source
- Reference 7AKAMAIakamai.comVisit source
- Reference 8DATAREPORTALdatareportal.comVisit source
- Reference 9WEARESOCIALwearesocial.comVisit source
- Reference 10SIMILARWEBsimilarweb.comVisit source
- Reference 11OFCOMofcom.org.ukVisit source
- Reference 12THINKWITHGOOGLEthinkwithgoogle.comVisit source
- Reference 13APPSFLYERappsflyer.comVisit source
- Reference 14BRIGHTEDGEbrightedge.comVisit source
- Reference 15AHREFSahrefs.comVisit source
- Reference 16WORDSTREAMwordstream.comVisit source
- Reference 17HOOTSUITEhootsuite.comVisit source
- Reference 18SPARKTOROsparktoro.comVisit source
- Reference 19SHOPIFYshopify.comVisit source
- Reference 20DESTATISdestatis.deVisit source
- Reference 21ABSabs.gov.auVisit source
- Reference 22GARTNERgartner.comVisit source
- Reference 23IDCidc.comVisit source
- Reference 24GSMAgsma.comVisit source
- Reference 25STATCOUNTERstatcounter.comVisit source
