How to Use the Video Call Data Usage Calculator
Select your typical meeting length, number of meetings per week, and video quality to estimate data usage for Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, and other video call apps — broken down per meeting, weekly, and monthly.
Data Usage by Quality Level
Audio-only calls use about 30MB per hour, SD video (360p) about 340MB, HD video (720p) about 810MB, and adding screen sharing can push usage to around 960MB per hour. Actual usage varies with participant count and network conditions.
Ways to Save Data
If you're joining from a mobile hotspot or a limited data plan, turning off your camera and using audio only, or enabling data-saving mode in the app settings, is effective. Turn off screen sharing when it isn't needed for the meeting.
Frequently Asked Questions
Screen sharing adds screen-capture data on top of the video stream, using roughly 100-200MB more per hour than a regular video call. If you're sharing mostly text, turning off your camera while screen sharing saves data.
A 1-hour HD call uses roughly 800MB-1GB, so if your data plan is limited, it's safer to use audio only or drop to SD quality. Most video call apps also offer a data-saving mode in settings.