India to have 526 million Internet users by 2018: Report

New Delhi: Internet user base in India, the third largest after China and the US, is expected to more than double to 526 million by 2018, networking solutions giant Cisco said today.

Internet users in the world's second most populous nation stood at 213 million last year, Cisco revealed in its Visual Networking Index (VNI) Index Global IP Traffic Forecast and Service Adoption, 2013-2018.

"In India, there will be 526 million total Internet users in 2018, up from 213 million in 2013," the index said.

VNI expects networked devices in the country to swell to 1.8 billion by 2018.

"In 2013, 24 per cent of IP traffic in India originated from non-personal computer (PC) devices, however, by 2018 the non-PC share of IP traffic will grow to 65 per cent," it added.

Other devices/connections will have higher traffic growth rates over the forecast period, including TVs (from 13 per cent to 14 per cent), smartphones and tablets (from 11 per cent to 51 per cent) and machine-to-machine (M2M) modules (from 0.3 per cent to 1 per cent), it said.

According to VNI, Internet traffic in India is projected to jump by over five fold between 2013 to 2018.

"Internet traffic will grow 5.5-fold from 2013 to 2018, a compound annual growth rate of 41 per cent and reach 101 Petabytes per day in 2018, up from 20 Petabytes per day in 2013," VNI said.

Indian Internet traffic in 2018 will be equivalent to 160 times the volume of all traffic across the entire Internet in India in 2005. The average Internet traffic will reach 9 Tbps in 2018, the equivalent of more than 7.8 million people simultaneously streaming Internet HD video, it added.

"In India, there will be 104 million IPv6-capable fixed devices in 2018, up from 18 million in 2013, a CAGR of 42 per cent. There will be 527 million IPv6-capable mobile devices in 2018, up from 87 million in 2013, a CAGR of 44 per cent," it has forecasted.

Globally, VNI expects mobile and portable devices other than PCs to drive the majority of Internet traffic by 2018.

"By 2018, there will be nearly 21 billion global network connections (fixed/mobile personal devices, M2M connections, etc), up from about 12.4 billion connections in 2013," it said.

There will be 2.7 networked devices/connections globally per capita by 2018, up from 1.7 per capita in 2013. There will be 7.3 billion M2M connections globally, or nearly one M2M connection per capita, based on a 7.6 billion population by 2018, it added.

"The reality of Internet of Everything (IoE), the increasing demand for network mobility and the emergence of 4K video are among key trends highlighted in this year's forecast that represent significant opportunities for service providers today and in immediate future," Cisco VP (Products and Solutions Marketing Doug Webster said.