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Comcast is expanding its 1.2TB cap to its entire 39-state footprint in January

Customers that go over the limit will need to pay $10 for every 50GB up to $100.

Comcast is expanding its 1.2TB cap to its entire 39-state footprint in January
May 20, 2020 San Jose / CA / USA - Side view of Comcast Cable / Xfinity service van driving on the street. Comcast is the largest home internet service provider in the United States.

Starting next year, Comcast will implement a 1.2TB data cap on broadband usage in 12 states and the District of Columbia. The company has had a data cap since 2016, but this is the first time it will enforce it across all 39 states where it offers internet service.

The policy change was first spotted by Stop the Cap. In the first two months of the new year, Comcast will waive overage fees to acquaint customers with the new limits. Moreover, once every 12-month period, the company will also give customers a courtesy credit they can apply to the month where they went over the 1.2TB limit.

Once you go over your data allotment, Comcast will automatically bill you $10 for every additional 50GB of data your household uses, up to a maximum of $100. If you don’t want to worry about your usage, you’ll need to either spend an additional $30 every month on an unlimited plan or $25 monthly on the xFi Complete package that comes with unlimited data and a modem rental.

If you live in one of the following states, you’ll need to keep track of your usage: Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, West Virginia and the District of Columbia. Additionally, Comcast will implement the cap in parts of Virginia and Ohio where it wasn’t already in place. Incidentally, those areas are places where the company competes against Verizon (Engadget’s parent company) and its FiOS fiber-to-the-home service. As things currently stand, FiOS customers don’t have to worry about their usage.

In defending the new policy, Comcast told The Verge and other websites that 95 percent of its customers don’t use anywhere near 1.2TB of data in a given month. The median monthly data usage is closer to 308GB, according to the company. On its website, Comcast notes 1.2TB of data translates to about 21,600 hours of continuous music streaming or 34,000 hours of gaming.

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