Türkiye’s internet report card announced: Half of the traffic load is in a single application

According to the information compiled by the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure Information Technologies and Communications Authority (BTK) from the “Turkish Electronic Communications Sector Quarterly Market Data Report”, the majority of internet traffic in the fourth quarter of last year occurred over fixed connections.

The rate of fixed connections in total internet traffic was recorded as 83.5 percent, and the rate of mobile connections was 16.5 percent. In addition, 83.3 percent of download traffic was fixed and 16.7 percent was mobile, and 86.1 percent of upload traffic was fixed and 13.9 percent was mobile connections.

While the data in question reveals that fixed connections are still largely preferred in terms of both data downloading and data uploading and play a dominant role in internet use, when the distribution of total traffic by category is examined, it is seen that the use of “streaming media” stands out with 65.8 percent.

YouTube ranks first in both internet traffic and broadcast-based media

The application with the highest share in total internet traffic was by far YouTube. This application led users’ data consumption with a traffic share of 44.3 percent, followed by Instagram with 17 percent and TikTok and YouTube with 4.7 percent. The data in question indicates that user behavior is largely based on video content consumption and social media platforms constitute a significant portion of internet traffic.

YouTube was again the prominent application in the broadcast-based media category. YouTube, which had a share of 57.2 percent in total traffic, was followed by Instagram with 16.8 percent and TikTok with 6.1 percent. This showed that video content platforms are in a decisive position in digital media consumption and user trends are largely directed towards audiovisual content.

Instagram is the leader in instant messaging

The most widely used application in instant messaging was Instagram with 64.1 percent. Instagram was followed by Facebook with 15.2 percent and WhatsApp with 10.9 percent. These 3 applications constituted the majority of the total traffic and stood out as the main platforms where users met their instant communication needs.

The application that generated the most traffic in the software updates category was recorded as Apple Software Update. The application in question, which was the leader with a rate of 37.8 percent, was followed by Google Play with 31.3 percent and Windows Updates with 11.6 percent. It was observed that these 3 platforms dominated the total update traffic.

Steam stood out in accessing game content

The most widely used application platform in online games is Steam, the world’s largest PC game distribution platform. With a rate of 35.6 percent, Steam stood out as the primary platform for accessing game content. This platform was followed by Playstation with 21.9 percent, Epic Games with 9 percent, and Xbox with 5.3 percent. These data revealed that online game traffic is largely concentrated on platforms with multiplayer and high content volume, while mobile and independent games also have a significant user base.

The choice for voice calls over the internet is WhatsApp

The most widely used application in the VOIP category, which is voice conversation over the internet, is by far WhatsApp. WhatsApp, which accounts for 55.9 percent of total usage traffic, was the leader in this field. This application was followed by Facebook with 11.5 percent, Face Time with 10.4 percent, Snapchat with 4 percent and RTP with 2.9 percent. These 5 applications were among the primary preferences of users in meeting their audio and video communication needs. These data show that mobile-based communication applications have become dominant in VOIP traffic and that a versatile usage habit has developed with traditional video conferencing solutions.

The most widely used application by users for network-based storage was iCloud. iCloud, which ranks first in this category with a rate of 64 percent, was heavily preferred especially for data synchronization and backup services among devices within the Apple ecosystem. It was followed by Google Cloud Storage with 6.8 percent and Google Photos with 5.7 percent.

Considering the content production rates in all categories in the last year, the platform with the highest share was recorded as YouTube. YouTube, which constitutes the majority of content production with 39.7 percent, was followed by Instagram with 13.5 percent. This showed that video-based platforms are preferred by users for intensive content production and sharing. Monthly content production trends showed that the highest level (7.5 percent) was reached in the months of 2025 (especially February, March and September). These findings revealed that users produce more intense content periodically and that platforms’ content production cycles are affected by seasonal effects.

YouTube was the platform with the highest share in terms of content production rate in the “streaming media” category, which is defined as the technology of playing content such as video, audio and games on devices over the internet, with instant and continuous data flow, without downloading the entire files. While YouTube constituted more than half of the total content production in this category with 59.6 percent, it also stood out as the platform most preferred by users for video content production.