The percentage of IP traffic generated by PCs will increasingly be overshadowed by smartphones, tablets and even TVs. 

According to a report from Cisco, mobile and portable devices other than PCs will drive the majority of traffic by 2018. Cisco estimates that in 2013, 33 percent of IP traffic originated with non-PC devices. However, by 2018, the non-PC share of IP traffic will grow to 57 percent.

Cisco forecasts that PC-originated traffic will grow at a 10 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR), while other devices/connections will have higher traffic growth rates over the forecast period including TVs (18 percent), tablets (74 percent), smartphones (64 percent) and M2M connections (84 percent).

Video appears to be the driver for overall IP traffic growth. Higher quality video clips from sources like YouTube will send IP video traffic soaring to 79 percent of all IP traffic by 2018, up from 66 percent in 2013. Cisco said Ultra HD video will account for 11 percent of IP video traffic by 2018, up from 0.1 percent in 2013. 

Mobile devices on Wi-Fi, not cellular, will generate 61 percent of IP traffic by 2018. Wi-Fi will be 49 percent and cellular will be 12 percent. Fixed traffic will be only 39 percent of total IP traffic by 2018. In comparison, Wi-Fi was 41 percent; cellular was 3 percent; and fixed was 56 percent in 2013.

Cisco estimates that by 2018, there will be nearly 21 billion global network connections (fixed/mobile personal devices, M2M connections, et al.), up from about 12.4 billion connections in 2013.

The full report and video can be found here.