Video Is Eating the Internet: Cisco

Cisco Systems has released its annual Visual Networking Index Forecast, and it calls for video — lots and lots of video.

The big takeaway: Cisco predicted IP video would make up 80% of global Internet-protocol traffic by 2019, up from 67% in 2014.

On a regional basis, North America is expected to lead the way with 84% of traffic coming from video, as the Middle East and Africa see a leading 55% compound annual growth rate.

Driven by the proliferation of wireless access on a device basis, smartphones will dominate video consumption, well ahead of TVs, computers and tablets.

By 2019, Cisco also expects global IP traffic to eclipse 168 Exabytes per month by 2019 (1 Exabyte equals 1 billion Gigabytes), up from the 59.9 EB per month generated in 2014.