Netflix Gobbles Up One-Third of Peak Bandwith Traffic in US

From PC World: This fall, Netflix accounted for 32.7 percent of peak downstream traffic in the United States, compared to 29.7 percent last spring, according to a report from Sandvine. On a daily basis, Netflix averaged 23.3 percent of aggregate traffic, compared to 22.2 percent in the spring.

Still, Sandvine wonders whether Netflix has reached its peak in traffic share. The online video company unbundled its DVD rental and streaming services in July, resulting in a 60 percent price increase for many users. The price changes hit existing customers in September, which Sandvine says is the "month of reckoning" for Netflix.

Although Netflix probably won't see a drop in absolute traffic, competing services such as Amazon Prime Instant Videos may grow at a faster rate and get a bigger slice of the U.S. bandwidth pie. "Globally, Netflix will grow ... but in the United States specifically, we might have seen the peak," Sandvine's report says.

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