Instagram burns 40-50GB of mobile data per month - what gives?

[Real_Smoky]

Hello everyone!
 

I am having difficulty understanding something.
 

My friend has a fantastic data plan where they get 50GB of mobile data per month - same plan as mine.
 

However, they were surprised to find out all of their mobile data was spent. Confused, we took a look at what used it up.
 

Turns out Instagram ate a lotta GB 6 GB in November which sounds correct, then it gets cray in December with 30GB, 45GB in January and 25GB in February (as a note - we were away for 2 weeks abroad so we used it in our network for half a month). Their data saver on the phone and in Instagram are both turned off, but so are mine, and I used only around 5GB per month. We are both equally terminally online and send memes, pretty similar behavior, they definitely don't use it 5-10x more than I do. I am sure she turns Instagram off every time she uses it.
 

How can it drain so much data? What gives?
 

If it matters, they use a Samsung A32 with default OS, I use a Huawei P30 Lite downgraded to EMUI 10.
 

THANKS A LOT!

[johnt]

They are probably spending a lot more time on it than you are lol

[igormp]

In the last month I've used ~20GB on instagram. Seems reasonable, and I don't even follow that much people. If they follow tons of people with tons of stories and watch tons of reels that it seems to be ok.

[Real_Smoky]

2 hours ago, johnt said:

They are probably spending a lot more time on it than you are lol

Even if that was the case, I spend a lot of time and they certainly don't spend 5-7 times more time than me. 

 

2 hours ago, igormp said:

In the last month I've used ~20GB on instagram. Seems reasonable, and I don't even follow that much people. If they follow tons of people with tons of stories and watch tons of reels that it seems to be ok.

They follow less people than me and we both watch a ton of reels and send them to each other. There is no way they watch 5x the reels I watch, I doubt even twice as many. This could only make sense if instagram pre-loads massive amounts of videos, like if it somehow preloads dozens of reels each time it is opened. 

[igormp]

2 minutes ago, Real_Smoky said:

Even if that was the case, I spend a lot of time and they certainly don't spend 5-7 times more time than me. 

 

Your data usage is actually surprisingly low, maybe your phone's ROM is misreporting it?

4 minutes ago, Real_Smoky said:

They follow less people than me and we both watch a ton of reels and send them to each other.

Weird.

4 minutes ago, Real_Smoky said:

This could only make sense if instagram pre-loads massive amounts of videos

It does, not sure how many tho.

Maybe instagram could be delivering you lower quality videos or something like that due to your phone being older or just not properly supported by then like samsung is.

[Real_Smoky]

5 minutes ago, igormp said:

Your data usage is actually surprisingly low, maybe your phone's ROM is misreporting it?

Weird.

It does, not sure how many tho.

Maybe instagram could be delivering you lower quality videos or something like that due to your phone being older or just not properly supported by then like samsung is.

I think the usage data reported by my phone checks out with the data provided by my carrier.

Your explanation regarding the software version is the first thing that kinda sounds like it might be related. I downgraded to EMUI10 (based on Android 10) for reasons, and she is on Android 13. Her screen is just slightly higher res, though it is 90hz, I wonder if that is somehow related, though I would normally guess no, but I'm kinda grasping at straws. 

[igormp]

You can always test it out. Both of you need to check the current data usage, open instagram, scroll through 10 reels or so, close it and check the data usage once more and see if the consumption was similar-ish or not.