Mobile operator Three (3) UK reports that Mobile Broadband usage by Smartphone (iPhone, Android etc.) customers skyrocketed to total 80 TeraBytes (TB) of data during the recent New Year's Eve celebrations, which is a 600% surge over 31st December last year when a total of 14TBs was consumed.


Indeed New Year's Day 2012 saw data usage rise to 74TBs, which is up from 14TBs last year; just like the day before. Facebook continued to be one of the most popular sites and experienced a 20% jump in traffic between midnight and 1am.

The outcome is hardly surprising. Three (3) began a major u-turn last year when it reintroduced "unlimited" / "all-you-can-eat data" through their new The One Plan package. This was followed later in 2011 when the same provision was suddenly made available to all new and existing contract Smartphone customers for an extra charge of just £3 (monthly).

Back in September 2011 Three (3) put this change into perspective by stating that, on average, an iPhone 4 owner in February 2011 consumed 488MB (MegaBytes) of data but in August 2011 that figure had shot up to almost 1.2GB (1200MB). It's no surprise to see customers making the most of what they have been given.

In the meantime Three (3) has continued to upgrade its network with the latest 3G HSPA+ (up to 21Mbps) technology, work that should be completed during early 2012. After that they'll move on to readying the platform for 4G next generation LTE services, which will be several times faster.