Netflix imposes download limits on its platform — 100 active downloads per device with expiration dates and storage restrictions. But researchers in Japan have achieved a breakthrough that would theoretically allow users to download the entire Netflix catalog in one second.
The National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) announced it reached 1.02 petabits per second over nearly 2,000 kilometers of optical fiber. The record-breaking transmission speed translates to roughly 125TB per second.
According to IFLScience, Netflix housed approximately 18,000 titles as of December 2023. Assuming each title requires 7GB of storage, the complete catalog would need 123TB of data.
That volume fits well within the new transmission capabilities.
The international team led by NICT’s Photonic Network Laboratory created optical fiber cable containing 19 separate strands. The 19-core system enabled data transfer at 1.02 petabits per second over 1,808 kilometers — roughly equivalent to the distance from Sapporo to Fukuoka.
The April 2025 experiment represents a significant advancement in long-distance data transmission. Previous tests in March 2023 achieved higher speeds of 1.7 petabits per second but only over 63.5 kilometers.
The distance factor makes this breakthrough commercially significant.
Streaming platforms could leverage similar technology to transfer content between global servers more efficiently. Current real-world internet speeds peak at around 400 Gigabit/s or approximately 50GB per second.
AI companies require massive data transfers for training frontier models. According to April 2025 statistics from ExplodingTopics, nearly 403TB of data is generated daily worldwide. The NICT technology could theoretically download that volume in three seconds.
The researchers haven’t announced commercial deployment timelines or cost projections. NICT continues developing the technology as demand grows for faster international data transmission capabilities.
