Automotive Infotainment Will Dominate Cellular IoT Data Growth Through 2035

Why It Matters

The forecast reshapes how carriers, OEMs, and integrators allocate spectrum, edge resources, and pricing models, making high‑bandwidth vehicle services the new engine of IoT revenue.

Key Takeaways

• Automotive infotainment to generate 135.4 EB of IoT traffic by 2035
• Cellular IoT total traffic projected at 218.6 EB, 62% from vehicles
• Asia‑Oceania will account for half of global IoT data by 2025
• High‑bandwidth use cases push 5G edge adoption over low‑throughput sensors
• Logistics and other verticals will lag, contributing under 30% of traffic

Pulse Analysis

The Omdia study marks a turning point for the cellular IoT market, moving the conversation from sheer device counts to the sheer volume of data they consume. While early IoT deployments focused on low‑rate telemetry, the rise of connected cars equipped with streaming‑ready infotainment systems and frequent firmware‑over‑the‑air updates is set to generate 135.4 exabytes of traffic by 2035—over half of the sector’s total forecast. This data surge dwarfs the modest kilobyte‑per‑day footprints of traditional sensors and signals that high‑bandwidth services will dominate network planning.

For mobile operators and edge providers, the implications are immediate. The concentration of traffic in video‑rich automotive use cases drives demand for 5G spectrum, low‑latency edge nodes, and sophisticated traffic‑management tools, especially in regions like Asia‑Oceania where half of global IoT data is expected by 2025. Edge compute becomes essential to preprocess video streams and OTA payloads, reducing backhaul costs and meeting the tighter latency expectations of autonomous‑driving features. Consequently, carriers are likely to evolve beyond per‑SIM pricing toward usage‑based or tiered models that reflect bandwidth intensity.

Automakers, logistics firms, and system integrators must adapt their product roadmaps to this data‑centric reality. OEMs need robust OTA pipelines and content‑delivery networks that can scale without congesting cellular cores, while logistics providers should anticipate richer tracking data—potentially incorporating vision sensors—to stay competitive. Meanwhile, traditional low‑throughput verticals will continue to prioritize coverage and battery life, but they must coexist with a parallel high‑bandwidth IoT ecosystem that reshapes revenue streams and technology investments across the industry.