Sea of Thieves has turned open-world pirate adventures into one of the most fun co-op experiences on PC and Xbox.
With voyages that can run for hours, players spend serious time sailing, fighting, and treasure hunting together online.
Which naturally brings up one question, especially from players considering playing on a mobile hotspot or a limited home plan.
So, how much internet data does Sea of Thieves use?
On average, Sea of Thieves uses around 10 to 50 MB of internet data per hour, making it one of the lighter games you can play online.
Peaceful sailing and fishing sit at the lower end, while The Arena and busy PvP encounters push it toward the higher end.
In this article, I've broken this down in more detail.
I've also covered the game's install size, since that's grown into a genuinely bigger story than the hourly data usage!
So, without any further ado, let us dive right into it!
Internet Data Usage of Sea of Thieves
I found a genuinely useful discussion on the Sea of Thieves community forums, where a player who regularly hotspots the game from their phone broke down what actually drives the number up and down.
Their estimate puts usage at roughly 10 to 50 MB per hour, with fishing and calm sailing sitting at the low end, and The Arena PvP mode sitting at the high end due to how much more packet data gets exchanged during combat.
A separate player who plays SoT as their main online game on a 10 GB monthly hotspot allowance reported using about 3 GB over roughly a month of regular play, which lands comfortably within that same range once you account for daily playtime.
This also matches an independent multi-game comparison report, which placed Sea of Thieves at around 30 MB of internet data per hour, right in the middle of the community-reported range.
Given how well these independent sources agree, I'm confident saying the internet data usage of Sea of Thieves is around 30 MB per hour under typical playing conditions.
From this, it's pretty straightforward to figure out the weekly and monthly data consumption as well!
If you play Sea of Thieves for one hour every day for a week, the total internet data used would be around 210 MB per week.
And if you play for one hour every day throughout an entire month, the total data consumed would come out to around 900 MB per month.
Now, you might also want to know how much data Sea of Thieves uses based on how long you play each day.
I've put together a handy table below to help you with exactly that!
I've done all the math already, so you don't have to worry about it.
Here's the table:
| Playtime per day | Data usage per day | Data usage per week | Data usage per month |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 hour | 30 MB | 210 MB | 900 MB |
| 2 hours | 60 MB | 420 MB | 1.76 GB |
| 3 hours | 90 MB | 630 MB | 2.64 GB |
| 4 hours | 120 MB | 840 MB | 3.52 GB |
| 5 hours | 150 MB | 1.03 GB | 4.39 GB |
| 6 hours | 180 MB | 1.23 GB | 5.27 GB |
| 7 hours | 210 MB | 1.44 GB | 6.15 GB |
Note: The data usage of Sea of Thieves has been taken as 30 MB per hour in the above table, and does not include voice chat.
Does Sea of Thieves use a LOT of Internet data?
No, and this genuinely surprises people given how big and busy the open world feels. Sea of Thieves is comfortably on the lighter side for hourly data.
Where Sea of Thieves genuinely does use a lot of data is the install size, and this is where the real story is.
The game launched at around 47 GB, but has since ballooned dramatically as years of Tall Tales, seasons, and content updates have piled on top of each other.
Players now commonly report installs anywhere from 80 GB to well over 120 GB, with plenty of community frustration about how large the game has gotten relative to what it actually offers on disk.
Voice chat will also add a bit on top of the hourly figure if you're crewing up with friends, though it's a relatively small addition compared to the base game's already-light data footprint.
So overall, if you're playing on a limited connection, Sea of Thieves is genuinely one of the safer picks, just make sure the initial install and any big content updates happen over Wi-Fi.
Conclusion
In this article, I've answered one of the most commonly asked questions among Sea of Thieves players: how much internet data the game actually uses.
I've also covered why the install size, not the hourly rate, is the real data story with this game these days.
I'll keep updating the data in this article as things change over time.
Note: The data in this article is up-to-date, as of 27th July 2026.
Now, I'd love to hear from you:
Do you still sail the seas? If yes, are you more of a peaceful fisher or a full-on PvP hunter?
Or maybe you've got a question!
Either way, feel free to drop a comment below and let me know!
Cheers,
Raj Oberoi