- Three UK reports an all-time traffic high of 1068 Gbps on its network during Real Madrid’s record-breaking win
- Sunday streaming caused all-time daily volume peak coinciding with latest season of Stranger Things dropping on Netflix
- New data peaks echo finding of Three’s ‘Mobile Britain 2022’ report, showing that football matches and Sunday streaming are key data usage drivers
30th May 2022 – As Real Madrid won their fourteenth Champions League title on 28th May 2022, Three UK’s network experienced a record-breaking night of its own with a new all-time data peak.
The UK’s biggest and fastest* 5G network saw data peak at 1068 Gbps between 21:00 and 21:15 on Saturday evening as record numbers connected to watch the Champions League final.
In Three’s ‘Mobile Britain 2022’ report, released in March, data showed that 81% of monthly peaks in the last two years were driven by football matches. However, none achieved as high a peak as the 1068 Gbps the network carried during the Champions League Final.
Stranger Things streaming surge
The following day brought another record for Three as the network reached its highest daily volume of all time. In total, 7408Tb of data was consumed on the network throughout Sunday, driven by an uplift in Netflix usage on the network. Traffic on the streaming service peaked 24% above the previous week, coinciding with the release of the fourth season of Stranger Things.
‘Mobile Britain 2022’ showed that Sunday had become the most popular day for users to stream their favourite TV shows and films. Sundays were the peak usage day for four of the first eight weeks of this year, having grown in popularity in each of the last five years. A third of people say they are now more likely to watch TV or a film on a Sunday than they were 5 years ago.
Commenting on the data surges, David Hennessy, Chief Technology Officer at Three UK, said: “Whether it’s enjoying live sport, or bingeing the latest much-watch series, our customers are streaming more than ever. Last weekend saw record-breaking levels of data consumed on our network. We can expect more data peaks in the months ahead, that’s why we are continuing to invest over £2 billion in improving 4G and rolling out 5G to all four corners of the UK.”
About Three
Three launched in 2003 as the UK’s first 3G only network, laying its foundations as the network that was born to be different. Today Three is a connectivity company that connects people to people, people to things and things to things and has 9.7 million customers.
Our network today covers 99% of the UK population and we carry 28% of the UK’s mobile data traffic.
Three launched 5G in August 2019, is the largest holder of spectrum in the UK and has been recognised by Ookla as having the UK’s fastest 5G network. It is the only operator able to meet the International Telecoms Union (ITU) 2020 standard of 100MHz of contiguous spectrum for full 5G services.
Three UK is a proud partner of Samaritans, where it will use the strength of its network and technology to connect 1 million people to emotional support.
Three was voted the Best Network for Data at the uSwitch Awards and the Best High Street Retailer at the Mobile Industry Awards.
Three UK is part of the CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd group of companies which has mobile operations in 11 countries. We employ more than 4,800 people across our offices in Reading and Glasgow and our 311 retail stores.
