Data collected during the period in which the eclipse was taking place showed a notable drop
Throughout this week’s solar eclipse, there was a noticeable decease in the amount of internet traffic in the United States, Canada, and Mexico – all countries that were a part of the eclipse’s path of totality.
The “Great North American Eclipse” took people voluntarily offline
Data shared by Cloudflare showed that “The Great North American Eclipse” led to a decrease in internet traffic within affected countries. It fell by 8 percent in terms of bytes delivered, and by 12 percent in terms of request traffic, when compared to the week before at the same time.
In fact, according to the data, Ohio, New Hampshire, Indiana, Maine, Arkansas and Vermont all experienced a drop of at least 40 percent during the span of time that the moon was eclipsing the sun.
All of those states were in the path of totality, which was not the case for other states across the country.
Internet traffic trends followed the eclipse through North America
The internet traffic trend began in Mexico, as the path of the eclipse began there first in North America. It traveled through states such as Coahuila, Durango, and Sinaloa, each of which also experienced the online usage trend. Even Mexico City was impacted in this way, despite the fact that it wasn’t in the direct path of totality.
The last country to experience the eclipse, and this internet usage trend – was Canada. Among the Canadian provinces, it was the smallest – Prince Edward Island – that was the most affected. Its population is under 200,000 people and half of its land was within the path of totality.
The conclusion Cloudflare drew was that both natural and human-related events can have a substantial effect on internet traffic, whether it’s a big sale – such as on Black Friday – the recent failure of the undersea cables that cut off several African countries, or the eclipse. Events that have people acting en masse impact the way they interact with the digital environment as well, whether it increases their use or decreases it.
