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Our Android devices are some data-hungry beasts! So much that they would be practically worthless without an internet connection. We have grown to depend on these services, and there is no doubt we are now using more data than we ever have. In fact, I used to be surprised when my data consumption went over 25 MB in a month. This was before smartphones came into the game – Now I use the same amount in less than an hour during a busy day.
Just how much data do we use, though? According to T-Mobile, its users are averaging at 760 MB per month during 2012. This is 30 times more than the 25 MB a month people used during 2009. Those in T-Mobile that own an HSPA+42 device are averaging at a whopping 1.3 GB a month, with speeds 100 times faster than 5 years ago.
These numbers may seem very small for some of us. But we must consider the amount of people that only use their smartphones for social media and emails. We are definitely seeing a big jump in smartphone knowledge and use. Regardless, us “hardcore” users will use much more data than this average. And we are pretty sure most of our audience does. But we would like to find out!
We must consider that being data-conscious is now a “thing.” With tiered and family shared data plans now in the equation, we know many of you are carefully counting your Megabytes.
Let’s start with me: I usually don’t use WiFi at home (spoiled by unlimited 4G LTE), and my monthly usage usually stays at around 3 GB a month. With some months being lower and some going as high as 6-7 GB. What about you?! Let us know by participating in the poll! And don’t forget to hit the comments section to let us know what carrier and data network you use.
[polldaddy poll=6319847]
[Via: GigaOM]
5+ with all those borrowed movies.
I use as much as 5.5 gigs a month roughly
i got unlimited 4g lte, but i barely use 1.5gb each month.
Usually 4-5.5 Gb.Just depends how much i am at home and how much i am away,
I use Netflix. I’m using over 8-10 a month, plus some wifi-tether to my tablet
I usually would rather watch Netflix on my tablet. But yeah streaming makes the GBs add up.
i like the GBs
lol
I can believe that they are right about this.
There have been several articles around the internets calling this out as bollocks.
Well alot of yall probably won’t believe me but I average 19-20 gigs a month
On just your phone?Wow man.Do you not have a connection at home?
Considering some people have used up to 45 and 80 gigs a month you’re in good company?
3-4 because Netflix sucks in Canada so I dont stream video.
That is so true. In May I used a free month promo they sent me to try it for the first time, and I gotta tell you – the selection is so limited that it’s not worth even $8/mt they usually charge.
80gig…hotspot for home internet and stream on TV. ThanK God for unlimited
im jealous, if ATT wouldn’t be stingy I’d use my phone for that too. i average 5.7GB without it
WOW! But yea, I guess if I only tethered from my phone that would be about what I would be using. lol
I’m around the house a lot and have a 30 Mbit connection so i generally use less than 500 MB per month.
On Verizon unlimited LTE I average about 11 gbs. It can go over 25 gbs if I do a lot of speed tests or download a lot of roms.
I have never actually downloaded a ROM straight from my mobile network. That must add up the data, for sure…
I wouldn’t trust it personally, though if you can get steady 20mbps+ speeds on LTE I could see how this could be viable. It would kick my landline internet to the junkyard.
I would certainly kick my landline internet. Cut loose all the wires as we have to get with the times and clear up the clutter… Cell Phones are capable of being so much more but we can’t get to that so much more with the carriers restraining it. Imagine always having information always readily available… At your finger tips never get lost its close to always being aware… Can’t always do that if you have to worry about a cap on the amount of knowledge you can receive of this world a month..
Yes knowledge or bad movies on netflix…same thing, right?
Roms at thee minimum are 100mb for bone stock at least 300mb for skinned i.e. touchwiz sense and miui imagine downloading every rom update that is easily usable.
I use to download rooms straight from my phone all the time, sometimes they were 300mb in size. Over Sprint 3G I would get about 1.5Mbps down, it would do the trick tho ;-)
Some of you data hogs make me sick. I hope verizon finds a way to kick you off. I know that won’t be a popular comment, but you are the reason verizon is screwing everyone else right now.
I’m allotted 5GB of month on my plan and i pay for it.If i pay for it,i’m going to use it.If i go over,i pay for that too.So i pay for everything i use.If it’s too expensive for you then maybe you don’t need a cell phone.Or maybe you need to change service providers.Verizon is notoriously expensive anyways.
I didn’t make myself clear, i guess. There are people using 80gb on their unlimited plan. They are the reason that you are stuck with a 5gb plan which probably costs you more than the unlimited one that I’ve still got.
There should be no limits on data period
Phone providers should have planned for this and spent their money on increasing the bandwidth. We need more data not less. As we become more and more dependent on the internet for our daily needs we will need alot more. I have been online with computers from the early 80 s back when you paid by the hour, it sucked you constantly were thinking about how much it was costing you and it wasn’t enjoyable.
The bs part of your comment is, if carriers want to charge us extra for overage, then y can we not get credit for what w don’t use. F the greedy carriers. It’s cheaper for the carriers to use 4g, but they try to make us think the opposite
That totally IS bs. I agree with you. And that system would not be in place had people not abused the unlimited data system in the past.
I really want to agree with u, but it’s called unlimited, not unlimited til u hit over 5gb. They Lure u in and switch n bate…i don’t think so. They ell what they market.then
I agree with yu (John Yu, that is). Unlimited, by definition, can’t be abused. If it were possible to use more than your share, how could it be called unlimited, as it would be limited to your share.
Btw, I use 3-4 gb/mo on my vzw unlimited data plan.
between 5 -6 would be more if I didn’t get throttled at 5
In May I used 45GB according to Sprint. I know they couldn’t wait to send me that Hot Spot cap notification. My wifi has been down, so shoot me. Maneuvering with the speeds have been more than enough of a punishment honestly.
Seriously… Sprint should pay you to use those speeds… lol.
Truth indeed.
Fix your wifi
I’d be insane before the end of June if I didn’t.
I’m at 6 gig now and my month started on the first
i use about 5.7GB per month. the carriers need to rework their plans… it’s just not working out ;)
I like my GBs
Because of LTE my usage is anywhere from 2GB to over 5GB. It varies.
I average only between one to two gigs tops
I selected 1-2 GB, but I have Wifi at home and at work (the two places I spend most of my time). If it weren’t for Wifi, I’d probably be using 5-10 GB.
Same for me.
The same here.
T-Mobile is STILL 2G here in Northwestern California though, as is Metro PCS, while AT&T, Verizon and U.S. Cellular are all 3G, plus AT&T has HSPA+ w/EB. Nobody has LTE here yet, but AT&T, Verizon and U.S. Cellular all plan to deploy it here eventually.
Ditto. Might not even hit 250 MB used this month! Still didn’t stop me from preordering a GSIII now to grandfather my unlimited data on Verizon before they end that! Just because I don’t use it doesn’t mean I don’t want the option!
I tested the speed test app and if you do that multiple times it will eat data up. Actually we are not hurting Verizons network. I spoke to 2 different reps at Verizon and one csr rep and they explained to me I can use as much data as I want and that Verizon uses a network optimization that is much different from throttling. If you are in the top 5% of data users on the unlimited plan inside a congested area (cell towers) than they will temporarily reduce your speeds to help the network but will return your speeds to normal if you leave that area or when less people are using it. That seems very fair to me. He told me not many people in my area use much data so I should be fine
up to 30 GB on 3 lines…completely wireless home w/all digital media, no cable/home phone/internet. ota tv, netflix, hulu, live sports sites etc., hdmi out, & audio/video out (wifi galaxy tab only). multiple bluetooth devices: lg headphones/soundlink/vehicle. xoom/charge/razr…waiting on gs3 preordered!!. lots of gb usage yes but 2 unilm htspts+2 unilm plans+3gb xoom pln = $155/MO. i pay for my data.
Oh and info about Verizon’s network optimization is on their website. I’m sure they could change it at any time
I have VZW lte and i use anywhere between 15 and 25gb per month.
Lol its only $30 on rogers in Canada… you guys are getting hosed!
Depends on what I am doing but I average about 7-8 GB a month. Some months as high as 10 GB.
30 GB+/Month
I forgot to mention that was for 6Gb…
I am with Sprint. I have gone as high as 12 gbs when I didn’t have wifi at home and I was tether all month. Now, I average 5-7. It would be lower if my office had better wifi speeds. I stream a lot of media on my devices.
10 to 15 a month. 20 GB was the highest. No Wi-Fi strictly network. Luckily I still have Verizon 3g unlimited.
Im using about 5 gb a month on unlimited data with a DROID X2 my girl has ishit 4s and she uses about 800 megs
I’m at 58 GB. That’s from Netflix and YouTube, RSS feeds, surfing the internet. I don’t tether much so that’s just my phone usage.
I use no less than 6 gb a month, I don’t know how everybody keeps it under control down at 1 gig with all these phones can do.
2-4gb on my data plan. I’m on WiFi for most of my data heavy stuff.
I demo with my device everyday. It is rare that I surpass 3GB. The only thing that gets it close to 4 is using my Hotspot. I’m mostly a consumer of text based services anyway. (forums, news, blogs) I only really use Hotspot for updating star charts and such in the field or at a dark site as I’m an amateur astronomer.
3 GB on average via my phone a month, 4 if i tether a lot (not too often).
my tablet however… i’m glad its wifi only. 10+ GB a month :P
I download torrent, so I use morethan 5 GB.
I used up at least 6GB per month of 3G on my old and laggy DroidX. I usually keep my data off to save battery and because it’s too slow to be used anyway. My data usage shall be interesting once I get my Galaxy S3 with unlimited LTE.
1-2GB on 3g, but move to 4g LTE on verizon and speedtests take up a lot more bandwidth. 12-20GB is actually viable if I could get 1 whole month of living in 4g. Though I think without speed tests 4GB would be doable.
I think I’m probably averaging between 6-8 GB per month. Most of that is on Sprint’s 4G wimax.
average between 5-6GB a month on VZW 4G. going to have to use more WiFi now since I’ll have to drop my unlimited data next time I upgrade.
Why would you upgrade and lose your unlimited. Buy the phone and keep it. Its cheaper.
Because I use netflix at the gym, I’ve been using 8+ gb. I’m keeping my vzw unlimited data plan, therefore!
About 1.5gbs, and most of that is streaming music
I use about 6-7 gb per month on average.
I use average 12-18 gb per month on AT&T. Been using a non-branded phone to get around the throttle since it’s not noticed as a smartphone. Currently using a HTC Amaze on the non-smartphone plan. Haven’t been under 10 gb since my N1 two yrs ago (first android), and not under 5 gb a month since my 3gs beforehand (6-09 to 4-10).
We cancelled our internet about 2 weeks ago, I’ve used 10GB just in 4G wireless hotspot tethering. About 12GB total, including youtube and Google Play updates.
I only use a mere 100-200mb a month, but I use 1-2gb of wifi at home.
considering how slow my data speed is and sucky my connection is around here I use less then 500mb
I usually average 11GB a month….. Damn I love Sprint!!! :)
My phone is my home internet. I am paying for unlimited 4g and unlimited tether.
What carrier?
I got the 5gb double data plan on Verizon but I haven’t came close to that yet about 6 out of my 10. But when I had sprint I would use about 35gb playing XBL at work.
On average, I probably use 4-5 gbs. That’s with using wifi at home.
i have a 6GB plan through V-Mo canada and i am usually between 5.7 and 6.8 (6.8 is the highest i have gone….)
I used 16 gb last month of my amazing gnex with unlimited Verizon 4G LTE
5.25 with one more day in my month. have used 10+ in months past.
average 2-3 because I use wifi at home, but when I need to tether my Tprime it can be 6-7
I’m from Aus, and our mobile speeds are nowhere as fast as yours. I usually use about 700mb as that’s how much allocated data I get, but I do use my uni wifi and home wifi.
I used just over 6g last month. Funny part is I always leave wifi on so when I am able to connect I can…..I am certainly on my phone too much!
That is no tethering either…..mostly YouTube and music streaming!
I said 1-2GB a month, but I pay for a 5BG plan…was thinking of the future.
On VZN 3g over the last 6 months Ive avg 19.83 GB’s of data usage !! 3/6 months were as low as 25 gb and as high as 36.. #Wowsers !!
10 gb (Sweden)
I average 8-10G a month on my line alone, i have 4 lines on my account.
I use between 25gb and up to 55gb per month. Phone is primary internet source.
Let me guess… Sprint?
I also use wi-fi at home and my friends/family’s homes. We have 4G-LTE where I live, and I have the Razr, but it’s not that reliable, so I have found that the wireless is faster and less clitchy. I’m on Verizon…I picked 1-2 GB…
I really like this poll. Verizon touts that most users use 2gb or less a month. Yet this poll shows that 57%+ uses 2gb or more. I think it is time for Verizon to do some new research. At least give us actual amounts used for 3g vs 4g. People upgrading to a 4g phone and the shared data are going to be be screwed if they rely on the amount Verizon always quotes.
As much as I don’t want to defend Verizon, this poll is meaningless. The poll relates only to the techies, geeks and fanboys that read Phandroid – undoubtedly only a miniscule fraction of VZWs Android customers. And, considering that even some of these commenters use less than two gigs, it’s possible that Verizon is correct.
I’ve used 7 gigs in the last week, thanks hulu lol, glad to have unlimited on verizon
I wish I could use more but sadly I live in canada where data plans suck so I only have 500mb available per month.
Verizon knows exactly how much data their customers use. You need to remember that the good folks on Phandroid are probably heavier users than the average customer out there. Therefore, this poll isn’t going to be completely accurate.
Exactly.
I predict that in about 5 years our cell phone data plans will be like how home internet is and pay for the level of speeds and not gbs. Eventually it might do away with home internet plans and will be combined.
Being a user of Sprint and using my unlimited plan to stream over wimax, I consumed 15 GB one month after a tornado had knocked down our phone lines and it took two days for Comcast to fix it.
I’m using 6-8GB/month on Sprint. I think if those on other carriers didn’t have to meter watch, they’d use more too.
Still on Verizon’s unlimited data = awesomeness …. at least until my contract expires….probably just won’t renew my plan once it’s done and just go month to month. Last month I pulled in 50gb :) … it’s been higher than that before tho.
edit. i think it’s because of people like me why unlimited plans are getting ditched…
No…it’s because of common corporate greed. >.<
8-9/month
Thanks to my grandfathered unlimited data plan, I don’t have to worry about it! :p
3-4 I have wifi at home but at work I’m using the hell out of my Sprint Nexus. Also tether quite a bit when I want to use my iPad. Hope sprint lights up LTE soon
Last three months, I have been averaging over 10 GB/month….
Samsung Droid Charge – Unlimited Verizon LTE – 10-12GB’s/mo.
Well.. i dont complain about ceiling per month…. my t mobile phone have limit 5GB per month… i have use 3G WatchDog apps.. i must have this apps!!!… it’s will tell me how much i use for one day… also, it’s alert me if i use too much…. it’s have widget also! Go and get it…
1.5-2 on T-Mobile with galaxy nexus
I use about 8gb or more a month on average. Mostly streaming music and downloading rom’s straight to the phone. Here in Israel, I pay approx 21$ for Unlimited (10Gb) and then they reserve the right to cap my speed and I can tether from my phone.
500MB-1GB
Most of my usage is on Wifi. My Data plan only includes 500MB (Get charged £5 per extra 500MB), I expect I’d use more if it was included.
On 4g tmo I will always go over 5gb on WiFi more than 10gb easy ever month
I use about 60 a month.
I pay $20 for 5 gigs on tmobile. rarely get over that! I stream netfix, YouTube videos. listen to pandora. update apps. use navigation daily have auto sync on for emails at all time. And serf the web multiple times per day.
200-500 mb/month. I have a limit on 6GB but mostly use wifi. 27/5 mbit on wifi and 6/3 on 3G so wifi is more convenient ;-) I only use 3G for surf/mail and a little youtube. I have music and larger files stored on my phone.
I average around 8GB a month on Verizon. Hit 13GB last month. Netflix on the train is a big consumer. I’ll be hanging onto that unlimited plan as long as I can.
2-3 GB, but most of that is on my wifi, on my data plan I use around 500 mb in a month I think. Then again, I hardly stream anything to it, most things are stored locally and removed once they are of no use anymore…….Wish I had a good service to stream from though, that would put my MHL adapter too good use.
In my life I’m surrounded by wifi at my work, home and university. 900mb-1.2gb data though. Att limits me at 2 gb but its really just a reminder to connect to wifi at all times. Plus wifi is faster since att does not really cover much 4g area.
Non at all. Mainly because the places I go to in a typical week for me has WiFi, haha.
I use between 2 and 3gb a month. Limited to 3 under AT&T
2-3 gb a month, up to 4 if I have time to stream Netflix.
I routinely hit 6gb
I picked 4-5 GB, but some months I easily exceed that. This month I am a sitting on 4.5 GB used with 14 days to go.. I’ve been streaming the US Open on my tablet, while tethered. I’ve had similar usage during football season.
Usually 10-11GB A month o&c and pandora ad up
7-8 gb a month because I use tethering all the time Verizon 4g lte
21GB per month here.
I use 2-3 GB, but I am constantly on WiFi at work and at home. That is just weekend use.
38GB last month
Nice, tethering?
On my T-Mobile account On average around 4-5 MB. Like the rest of the data users I use wifi whenever possible. I have wifi at home and office.
Then on my unlimited Verizon account I can go over 10 MB very easy. Streaming a Netflix Movie can suck up allot of data. I will try to use wifi whenever possible but if I am on a jobsite and I want to take a lunch brake and I turn to Netflix for the crew then the data can get sucked up quickly. With LTE speeds the Carriers need to give better deals on data. What good is LTE if you can not use it?
For me 3-4 Gb is only on my phone. Have Wifi in the office and at home.
All put together it would be around 15GB.
I’m in india and use Vodafone
last month i used about 9gb of data. i hardly ever connect to wifi but i do disconnect from the internet to save my battery some… i think it may be because i stream a lot of music and have my photos set to auto upload to g+. i cant think of much else that runs up the data that fast, but i hardly use my laptop and my phone is always in reach so i pretty much use it for everything. right now its the middle of the month and i’m at 4.35gb of data including 3g and wimax 4g
If this change works out well for Verizon, the other carriers will follow suit in order to remain competitive. If it doesn’t, Verizon will change to a more successful model. Either way, being able to use your phone plan as a substitute for internet service at your house will eventually become impossible,
10GB will be enough to cover the five phones on my plan.
I’ve definitely hit over 100GB before, I am pretty sure Verizon HATES me.
Just looked. I am at about 1.5 GB and my wife is at about 1.75 GB. We have 3 days left in our monthly cycle. I don’t monitor it because we are on unlimited. I have seen it over 2 GB in months we travel a lot.
I use about 30gb of wifi data and use 10gb of mobile data monthly …I have Verizon with the 10gb plan and I am restricted to 10gb….I didn’t know about grandfathering yourself into unlimited data so I missed out on that… I’m sure I would be doing 15-20gb or more with unlimited …what do I do with all that data? I watch YouTube and download mix tapes and everytime I have a question about something I tend to search it…I have a galaxy nexus btw
I use about 1-2GB a month on my SGS1. I use wifi when at home, so that really lessens the use of my unlimited Verizon plan. I don’t really watch a ton of Netflix, Hulu, etc., unless I’m driving and tired of XM. Then I just use it to listen to TV shows, movies, and such.
My wife uses around 3-5 GB in any given month. I use about 5-7 GB in any given month. We both love to stream music and Netflix Vids on our phones =)
I use anywhere from 5-8 GB with my Galaxy Nexus, that’s on Verzions 4G
i use anywhere between 5 and 15 GB a month on my data plan through tethering and spotify etc. I normally encourage others to use mine as it is unlimited.
I use anywhere between 10-20+ GB a month on the three network UK. i rarely use wifi as have an unlimited plan and my 3g connection is faster than my home wifi. But do sometimes use wifi at work as dont get a signal in most of the building at work. Can tether on my plan but havent yet bothered to do that as have an unlimited plan for broadband as well. Dont know how much i use over the landline broadband.
You know this poll will be inaccurate in regards to the general population… It’s still cool to see though.
Generally maybe 10-20gb a month.
I use between 12 to 15 gig a month no tethering not even on on my phone rare movie maybe 1 every two months mostly email surfing and SSH into servers I maintain. Plus backup to cloud for.backup and photos
6GB
Normally i consume a lot… but the last month or so my performance on sprint has been abysmal. starting to wonder if its my nexus.
Might want to do a master reset. I live in Colorado, but my data usage on my Samsung Galaxy S ll hits over 20GB a month just fine. Netflix, Pandora, letting my 300+ apps use background data and auto update. Works great on 3G and WiMax 4G. I speedtest on sprint at about 4mb/s on 3G and around 18mb/s on 4G wimax
With my job I travel non stop. I use all the bandwidth aloud to me over both lines. I tether a lot of that bandwidth away. A Hilton in New York wanted to charge us $2300 to hook up 10 lines in a conference room for 1 hour, immediately we started pulling our phones out and got to business. Android FTW.
I don’t have any other internet where I live, so between tethering and Netflix, I use a ton of data (and Netflix is only on my phone, since 3G isn’t fast enough for anything but basic web browsing at desktop resolutions). A couple months ago, I had almost 28 GBs on 3G, only about 400MB on Wimax (when I made it into Minneapolis). If someone would get me some DSL/cable, I’d lay off Sprint a bit!
6-8 GB a month. I stream internet radio about 3-5 hours a day. I also do a lot of web browsing and watch some videos.
I average around 10GB a month because I download full movies from youtube and games such as N.O.V.A. 3 which need 2GB of free space to download. T-mobile is my carrier and i’m using 3G.
I use 10 GB between a Galxy Nexus and iPhone 4S
I use another 10 GB my Sierri Hotspot 3G/4G connected to 1 iPad 3rd Gen
I do have home connection and do offload to wifi as much as possible
16.4GB this month. This is the most amount of data that I have ever used. Partly because I have 4G and the other past is because I ended FiOS at my pace the beginning of the month. Netflix and my Podcasts take up a lot of data. If I didn’t have unlined through Verizon, I wouldn’t be able to stay with then. I think I probably average 8GB per month.
I use about 10 GB a month on Sprint. I would use a lot less if I was able to get a broadband connection. I moved into a new subdivision that isn’t covered by any service provider at the moment.
Well…… To put it in perspective I used 4.6 GB of data on Youtube in the past week alone, and none of that was streamed in HD (thats a lot of youtube :P) and that just youtube, I’ve been known to flash a custom ROM or two which then results in me re-downloading all my Tegra games (This data is from an Asus TF300 but I also have a Nook Tablet running CM9). I usually get upwards of 30 GB of data a month, so I guess you could call me a “Power user” of sorts.
(And no I dont watch Pr0n or torrent things on this, this is simply apps, youtube and web browsing.)
I use about 45GB a month on 4g (verizon)
I thought my 20GB on sprint was a lot o.o
I use over 20gb a month on my Galaxy S ll through Sprint. Yes I’m serious. Thats without hotspot/tetgering use.
I normally use under a gig unless I do allot of traveling, but I don’t stream much on my phone.. I just have better devices to play music and movies and TV shows on, the little screen doesnt do it for me. And for all that and other reasons I have Cable net that grants me a 100mb connect and I use my wifi when at home..
I use WiFi for most of my downloads, since it’s faster than my data connection, so my usage is usually < 500 MB
15gb a month big red 4glte
7-10 GB a month on Verizon LTE. Admittedly I don’t usaully use wifi, but this is not me trying to abuse the unlimited data, it’s just normal usage for me.
The most i’ve ever been able to use was 800mb. I’ve TRIED breaking a GB before by streaming a ton of music on Spotify but still couldn’t get past 800mb. So I guess i’ll be just fine with my 4gb cap.
2->3 GB per month, some months up to 5. T-Mobile HTC Sensation, an HSPA+ 14 device. Expect that number to rise significantly when I have access to LTE.
Last month I used 22g. Typically, I run around 10-12g per month. I use my Rezound as a mobile hot spot for my iPad and Galaxy 7.7 which pretty much drives my data use.
2gb sprint
With Verizon my limit is 4GB and that is the only reason I don’t go past that.. If I had unlimited data I’d probably actually use my now useless Netflix app (because of tiered data) every once in a while and definitely more YouTube so I can see myself using at least maybe 5 or more.. I wish I had switched to Verizon back when they had unlimited data but the Evo was calling my name and I ended up at Sprint :-/
About 30 to 25 gigs a Mont on sprint 3g since I get about 2.5 mbps here were I live and 4g is about 200 miles away and this is only me, the other 2 lines on my plan use up about 10 to 12 gigs each
Around 5-6 typically. As much as 14. An additional 10ish GB a month on wifi.
I deliver, I work 12+ hours a day, 6 days a week. I’m alone in a van and bored out of my mind. THANK GOD FOR NETFLIX AND SPRINTS UNLIMITED INTERNET. 60GB+ monthly
I use anywhere between 10-17GB. (T-Mobile employee acct)