85+ Big Data Statistics To Map Growth in 2025

When you think about data, follow the zeros.

As in 18 zeroes, as in more than 2,500,000,000,000,000,000 bytes (or 2.5 quintillions) of data are created each day. As in, holy guacamole.

This exorbitant amount of data relates to all things: our preferences, interactions, and everything else we do on the internet and connected devices. Companies take heaping servings of this data – millions of scraps at a time – and turn them into actionable insights using big data analytics software.  

Did you look for sneakers online last night? And are you now getting sneakers ads on every website you visit? That’s the work of big data.

Big data is transforming how businesses operate. In fact, what we call big data is slowly moving from being a fad to something normal as businesses and governments use huge amounts of data to improve what they do and how they do it. 

We’ve gathered some recent big data statistics and data facts that illuminate the topic, its relevance, and its trajectory. Knowing the scope and impact of this ongoing data revolution is helpful regardless of how your business uses big data.

Big data growth statistics: How much data do we create?  

We create data everywhere – in the quick Google search we do, in the hundreds of texts we send on WhatsApp, in millions of Instagram photos and TikTok videos we share, and even in the weather app we use on our smartphones.

From smartphones to connected cars, the explosion of the Internet of things (IoT) has fuelled a data inferno. This vast volume and variety of data coming in at incredible velocity is called big data. Take a look at these statistics to understand how much data we create.  

• An internet user generates about 1.7 megabytes (MB) of data per second.
• As of January 2024, there are 5.35 billion internet users worldwide, which amounts to 66.2% of the global population. 

• 463 ZB of data will be created every day by 2025, which will be worth $229.4 billion.
• By 2025, people will create more than 181 ZB of data. That’s 181, followed by 21 zeros.
• By 2025, there will be 55.7 billion connected IoT devices. These IoT devices alone will generate almost 80 ZB by 2025.
• An internet user would need more than 180 million years to download all the data from the web.
• Nearly 80% of companies estimate that 50%-90% of their data is unstructured. Think text, video, audio, web server logs, or social media activities. 

How big is big data?

When we say big data, we aren’t talking about megabytes and gigabytes but petabytes (more than a million gigabytes) and exabytes (more than a billion gigabytes).

Take a look at what happens on the web in just 60 seconds to see the volume and speed at which we create data online.

• 5.9 million Google searches happen.
• Instagram users share 66,000 photos.
• Facebook users post 1.7 million pieces of content.
• People send 231.4 million emails.

• YouTubers upload 500 hours of videos every minute in 2024
• Snapchat users send 4.3 million snaps.
• Twitter users write 347,200 tweets.
• People send 16 million texts.
• Venmo users transfer $437,600.
• Amazon shoppers spend $443,000.
  
  

Big data and business statistics

Big data is the oil that businesses run on. Organizations use big data tools to find trends and patterns from the vast volume of structured and unstructured customer-generated data.

Data-driven companies use big data and business analytics to make informed decisions. This improves their sales, customer service, and product offerings and ultimately boosts their profits. Here are some statistics that show the business vote of confidence in big data. 

• 4 out of 10 companies use big data analytics.
• 48% organizations have created a "data-driven organization" in 2024, which is double from 2023's survey of 24% companies. 
• Nearly 54% of companies will increase their investments in innovation in 2024.
• 75% of enterprises anticipate notable advancements by integrating AI-enabled solutions with big data to improve decision-making.

• Data modernization, or transferring of data from legacy environments to cloud-based environments, was the top focus of data and analytics investment in 2024.
• 92% of data administrators and other IT professionals will expect to have generative AI in production within 2024.
•  Netflix’s recommendation algorithms, powered by big data, influence 80% of all content watched and save the company over $1 billion annually.
• Most large and small businesses focus on implementing big data tech.
• 19% of executives say they have established a data culture in their company.

Benefits of big data statistics

Let’s touch on the benefits of big data and analytics that have made it an essential tool for companies in many sectors.

• Almost two-thirds of digital leaders think big data and analytics will be the top 2 technologies to deliver competitive advantage in 2024.
• 82% of organizations with advanced maturity in data and analytics saw positive year-over-year (YOY) revenue growth over the past three years.

• Over 50% of executives say they are driving business innovation with data.
• 92% of data leaders say their company got measurable business value from data and analytics investments.
• 78% of data chiefs predict that their data investments will increase in 2024
• 4 out of 10 companies have seen measurable benefits and cost savings from data and analytics initiatives.
• 22% of chief executive officers believe using data effectively to develop new products and services is an important source of their growth in the next five years.
• A fifth of digital leaders feel they are effectively using data insights to generate more revenue.

Big data market statistics

The advantages of big data have boosted the market for big data tools and services, starting from capturing and storing data to processing and analyzing.  

• 97.2% of businesses are actively investing in big data and AI
• Over half of the funding into big data companies came in between 2019 and 2021.
• The big data analytics (BDA) market size will grow from $104.19 billion in 2023 to $118.55 billion in 2024 at a compound annual growth rate of 13.8%
• Global spending on BDA solutions is expected to grow at the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.8% till 2025. 
• $283.5 billion was the share of the big data and business analytics market size in 2024 and is expected to reach $1548.8 billion by the end of 2037.

• By 2029, the BDA market is set to more than double to a staggering $655.53 billion.
• G2 has three software categories under big data: big data analytics, big data processing and distribution systems, and event stream processing software.

Big data market size by region

Here’s the regional breakdown of the BDA market.

• The North American BDA market will hit $169.91 billion by 2028.
• By 2037, North America will hold a 42.8% revenue share of the big data and business analytics market.
• Europe's BDA market will reach $105.82 billion by 2027.
• By 2025, the Asian/Pacific region will spend around $53.3 million on BDA solutions.
• The United States holds the highest share of big data market that is 73.3%, followed by China, with a 69.1% market share.
• The big data market in East Asia is set to advance at a 20.7% CAGR through 2034. 

Big data storage statistics

With big data adoption, companies are shifting from traditional data storage systems like relational databases. More efficient, scalable, and effective systems like cloud storage are becoming the most preferred storage for big data analytics.

• Over 60% of all corporate data is in cloud storage.
• 100 zettabytes of data will be stored in the cloud by 2025.
• 29% of firms with intermediate data and analytics maturity and 45% of companies with advanced maturity are going for a cloud-first approach.
• 48% of hybrid cloud storage users consider its ability to process large datasets as one of its biggest benefits, according to a G2 survey.

• There are 8,000 data centers in the world.
• IT spending on data center systems is set to surge in 2024, reaching a record of $5 trillion. 
• The United States of America has more data centers than Germany, the United Kingdom, China, and Canada put together.

Other big data technology statistics

Apart from cloud storage, big data has also powered other technologies like Hadoop, NoSQL databases, and data lakes, all of which are useful for processing large amounts of data.

Big data companies are leveraging these new technologies to provide advanced BDA tools. Here are the statistics to prove it.

• The global market value of Hadoop, the open-source framework used to store and process large datasets, will reach $842.25 billion by 2030 from just $33 billion in 2021.
• G2’s NoSQL database category saw an 81.33% growth in traffic from February 2022 to March 2022.
• As for data lakes, the market will grow at a CAGR of nearly 30% through 2026.

Big data job statistics

As companies invest in big data and data science tools, there’s an increasing demand for people skilled in data science. In fact, businesses fear that skill shortages will hurt their ability to realize the full potential of the data they have.

• 49% of executives say there is a lack of talent to analyze the data.
• The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) expects a 36% growth in data-related occupations between 2021-2031, higher than any other sector.

• On average, 13,500 new data scientists jobs will open in the U.S. each year from 2021 to 2031.
• The average salary of data scientists is more than $100,000 per year.

Big data challenges statistics

The big data industry is not without significant challenges and worries. These statistics show the problems businesses face with big data technologies.

• Nearly 7 out of 10 C-suite executives consider security and risk as the biggest pain points related to big data analysis.
• Other concerns around big data analytics among C-suite executives are metadata and governance (41%) and slow data ingestion (31%).
• 61% of companies think that the fast-growing volume of data is limiting their ability to harness their data fully.
• Data professionals see data volume grow by an average of 63% every month in their companies.
• More than 80% of IT decision-makers agree their analytics projects are delayed within their company due to data not being available in the required format.
• 8 out of 10 companies had to rework data analytics projects due to poor data quality.
• 49% of executives say the current data solutions aren’t flexible enough.
• Only a quarter of companies say they’re doing enough to ensure responsible and ethical use of data within their business and industry.

Future of big data

Despite the challenges, big data is the biggest game-changer for businesses. Companies are now looking to use much-evolved big data tools like business intelligence (BI) and predictive analytics that employ artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) algorithms. ML models train on larger datasets than ever before with big data. Companies are also moving to real-time analytics with platforms like stream analytics.

• 44% of business leaders say that they ware planning to implement data modernization to take better advantage of GenAI.
• Majority of executives note changes in data culture contributed to an increase in adoption and usage of BI and analytics tools.
• 72% of businesses are looking to build AI enhancements in their business intelligence platforms in the future.
• The other top choices for future data and analytics technologies include text analytics (67%) and speech analytics (65%).
• The streaming analytics market, driven by big data and AI, is expected to grow at a CAGR rate of 26.5% to $50.1 billion.

Big data, bigger benefits

The unprecedented data revolution shows no signs of letting up, so pay attention –  it may impact your business unexpectedly. It’s sure to affect the world around you. Keep your ear to the ground and stay up on big data developments as the march of quantification continues.

Learn more about big data examples and applications to see how it's transforming processes across industries.