Money Australia – July 2017

easily pre-download your content and spend way less

onamedium-useplan.

If you prefer the convenience of streaming on the go,

Hanlonsaysthesitesareatleastdoingasmuchasthey

cantomakesureyou’reusingyourdataefficiently.Each

appallowsyoutochangethebitrateofyourstreamso

that you can view or listen to your content at a low

quality,savingyoudata.Mostappsalsoissueidlewarnings

to make sure you haven’t fallen asleep or walked away

from your phone without ending your stream.

GAMING, NAVIGATING

AND SHOPPING

Onlinegamesdon’tuseupasmuchmobiledataasyou

would expect. WhistleOut tested two popular mobile

games – Hearthstone, a medieval card game with 10 million

to 50 million downloads on Google Play, and Fire Emblem

Heroes, a Nintendo role-playing game with between

1millionand5milliondownloadsonGooglePlay.These

twopopularappsaveragedatiny3MBanhour,soyou

couldplaybothgamesseveralhoursadaywithoutbreaking

1GBinamonth.Thismightgiveyouabetterideaofwhere

your teenager’s data is going – or rather, where it definitely

isn’tgoing,despitewhattheymaytellyou!

Hanlon says navigation apps like Google Maps and

AppleMapsarealsosurprisinglylowdatausers.“I

quicklylookedatmymapsdatauseforthismonthand,

even though I’ve used it a fair bit this month, it was only

about 15MB,” he says.

“It’s really just downloading the bits that you need

STREAMING
Untilrecently,theriseofthenewstreamingappsin
Australiamadelargedataplansof8GBandabovehighly
appealing.Culturevultureseagertocatchupontheir
favourite television shows on their commute could use
NetflixorStanonthego–albeitattheexpenseoftheir
data.AudiophilescanuseSpotifyandAppleMusicto
listentothelatesttracksandcuratedplaylistsinreal
time – whatever songs you want, whenever you want.
Butrecentupdatestotheseappsmeanthatyoucansee
andhearasmuchasyouwantonthegowithoutusing
asinglemegabyteofyourmobiledata.
Youcannowpre-loadalotofvideoandaudiocontent
usingwi-fibeforeyoutravel.Spotifyhashadthisfeature
thelongest,followedbyNetflixand,mostrecently,
Stan.“You’dbesillynottodownloadyourvideosin
advance,” says Hanlon. “You might find it more convenient
just to stream on the go, but if you’re really data conscious
you could plan ahead.”
What sort of savings are we talking about? The music
streamingsitesarethelesspotent,withSpotifyusing
about150MBanhour.Thiscomestoabout4.5GBa
monthifyoustreamforatleastanhoureveryday.The
data savings for video streaming are even more significant.
Ofthethreebigvideostreamingapps,Netflixuses
the least amount of data at 250MB an hour. One hour
adayofNetflixonthegowoulduse7.5GBinamonth.
Stan surprisingly uses the most, at 570MB an hour or
17.1GBoverawholemonth.
Soifyouwereonalargedataplantojustifystreaming
video content for at least an hour every day, you could

If you’re looking for ways

tocutbackonyourdata,

disablingFacebook’svideo

auto-play feature is a must

CHEAPEST LOW-USAGE PLANS (1GB DATA)

TELCO CALLS + SMS DATA ALLOWANCE COST

OVO Mobile

$200 call credit and

unlimited SMS 1GB $9.95 per 30-day recharge

Jeenee Mobile Unlimited 1.5GB $14.90pm

Vaya Unlimited 1GB $16pm

Source: WhistleOut

CHEAPEST MEDIUM-USAGE PLANS (2GB+)

TELCO CALLS + SMS DATA ALLOWANCE COST

Yomojo Unlimited 2GB $19.90pm

Coles Mobile Unlimited 2GB $20 per 28-day recharge

Vaya Unlimited 2GB $22pm

Source: WhistleOut

CHEAPEST HIGH-USAGE PLANS (5GB+)

TELCO CALLS + SMS DATA ALLOWANCE COST

Yomojo Unlimited 6GB $29.90pm

OVO Mobile Unlimited 8GB $34.95 per 30-day recharge

TPG Unlimited 7GB $34.99pm

Source:WhistleOut