Why Does Video Chat Still Suck?

Almost as soon as Alexander Graham Bell introduced the telephone, forward-thinking inventors dreamed of adding pictures to the conversation. Despite early failed attempts to launch a successful videophone market, fantasy has finally become reality with smartphones and online video conferencing.

Bandwidth & Data Caps
In order to send both voice and video over the Internet, you need a fairly high-speed connection. However, according to the Pew Research Center, only 66% of American homes use broadband. The main reason is price, but there’s also the matter of infrastructure. The FCC reports that for approximately 19 million Americans, mostly in rural areas, wired broadband services like DSL or cable modems aren’t even available. While the National Broadband Map project shows that wireless accessibility reaches about 95% of the population, people still face roadblocks for video chat, such as data caps.
Although streaming regular online video over 4G can consume roughly 6MB of data per minute, two of the most popular video chat solutions — Skype and Apple’s FaceTime — both hover around 3MB per minute. (PCWorld found Google+ Hangouts are the worst, toppingaround 150MB for a 10-minute session.) But if you spent 10 minutes a day on FaceTime, you’re still logging around 900MB of data every month, which pushes you closer to that 3GB limit in no time. But if you spent 10 minutes a day on FaceTime, you’re still logging around 900MB of data every month, which pushes you closer to that 3GB limit in no time.

Of course, this doesn’t even account for other cellular concerns, such as upload speeds and variations in signal strength. According to a study conducted by PCWorld in April, the average 3G upload speed (the bottleneck in video chat) across America’s urban centers was just under 1mbps; 4G fared better at just over 3mbps. As long as you have a strong signal, this should handle your Skype call just fine. But testers experienced about a 10% drop in download speeds when they entered a building, so one can expect about a similar drop in upload speeds, as well. Furthermore, living in a rural area with fewer towers and intermittent signal strength will only degrade the video chat experience more; to the point, it might not even be worth trying.