Game downloads behind huge data traffic surge

Chorus' biggest data traffic surge since the Rugby World Cup took Kurt Rodgers, the company's network strategy manager by surprise.

Data traffic has grown hugely in recent years, but there are still surge events like the Call of Duty Warzone release.

This squares with earlier experience. Chorus’ biggest ever day for data was when Wales met France in the quarter final of the Rugby World Cup.  

During the game network traffic hit 2.6 Tbps. That was up 37 percent on the 2018 peak. The second busiest day was when England played Australia in the other RWC quarter final,

Rugby World Cup aside, the biggest day in 2019 was on October 15 when. the Fortnite game was updated. Traffic hit 2.47 Tbps.

Earlier in the week Rodgers told me Chorus has noticed increased traffic with more people working from home in the wake of the Covert-19 pandemic. Chorus says it has more than enough network capacity to cope if working from home increases during the outbreak.