• nbn®Fair Use Policy – data limits

    This page provides an overview of the data limitations on nbn™ Sky Muster™, nbn™ Sky Muster™ Plus, and nbn™ Fixed Wireless plans.

    These limitations do not apply to nbn™ Fixed Line plans.

    This is not a comprehensive overview of the nbn™ Fair Use Policies. Please read the Fair Use Policies for yourself for additional requirements and limitations.

    Wi Fi

  • What is a Fair Use Policy?

    Your service provider buys its internet connection from nbn. It then sells a part of that connection to you.

    nbn has policies to manage how that internet connection is used, both by your service provider and by you.

    One of these policies is called the “Fair Use Policy”. It outlines what can and can’t be done on the nbn™ network. It aims to ensure the internet connection is fairly distributed among all the customers using it.

    Your service provider is responsible for ensuring you follow the requirements under the Fair Use Policy.

    Talk to service providers before ordering a service, to ensure the service is suitable for your purposes.

    Service providers can also implement their own Fair Use Policies, to ensure that the service they’re buying from nbn can be evenly provided to all their customers.

    While all nbn’s products are subject to the Fair Use Policy, data limits only apply to the Sky Muster™ satellite and Fixed Wireless services.

    We provide an overview of the data limits for retail plans on this page.

    You can read the Fair Use Policies for yourself.

  • Fair Use Policy for Sky Muster™ Plus connections

    Sky Muster™ Plus connections have metered and unmetered content types, in addition to peak and off-peak data inclusions.

    Unmetered content does not count to either peak or off-peak data limits.

    Metered content does.

    Broadly speaking, the only content that’s metered is streaming video services, or any traffic carried over a VPN.

    However, there are some limits to how much unmetered data can be transferred during peak periods; this is managed under the Fair Use Policy.

    Visit our page on Sky Muster™ vs Sky Muster Plus.

    If you breach any of these Fair Use Policies, you may be sent a warning, your connection slowed to 256kb/s for both uploads and downloads (enough for email and very basic web browsing, and not much else), or your connection cut off entirely.

  • You must not allow more than 20 separate devices to download software updates during a calendar month.

    Software updates are not metered under Sky Muster™ Plus.

    In general, you can therefore download as many device updates as they come out. However, the Fair Use Policy limits how many individual devices can be updated each month.

    A device is an individual internet-connected piece of hardware. This includes smartphones, tablets, laptops, and desktops.

    It also includes other “internet of things” devices such as weather stations, fridges, TVs, speakers, sensors and monitors, cameras, robotic systems, and so on.

    Be aware of how many devices are using your internet connection, and manage your software update settings to ensure no more than 20 are updating during any given month.

  • You must not download more than 30Gb over your peak metered data allowance, and 30Gb over your off-peak, metered data allowance

    If you’ve used up your metered data allowance, and have been shaped or slowed down, you can’t use more than 30Gb of that shaped data in a month.

  • You must not regularly email attachments that are 20Gb or larger

    Email is not an effective way to transfer large files. If you regularly need to transfer or access files over 20Mb in size, consider cloud file manager services such as Dropbox, iCloud, OneDrive, or using external or USB drives.

  • You must not excessively “scrape” or “poll” information from websites

    You may have business software that relies on regular updates from across the internet, or from one particular website, and automatically grabs the data it needs from that site.

    You’re allowed to do this, but it must not be “excessive”, by nbn’s standards.

  • Other limitations

    nbn™ lists other limitations to the Sky Muster™ Plus service.

    These aren’t listed in the Sky Muster Plus Fair Use Policy document, but may be found in other nbn™ documents.

    Some unmetered data may be shaped during peak hours of 4 pm –11 pm to wholesale speeds of 256 Kbps for uploads and 512 Kbps for downloads.

    This includes:

    • Peer to peer traffic
    • Uploads and downloads to cloud storage platforms (e.g. Dropbox, Google Drive)
    • Computer and smartphone operating systems updates
    • Software updates
    • Gaming updates
    • Activity related to applications which nbn cannot identify.

  • Fair Use Policy for Fixed Wireless connections

    Most retail service providers of an nbn™ Fixed Wireless retail (not business) connection will follow policy. Check with your internet provider to confirm if the nbn Fair Use policy applies to you.

    However, note that these limits don’t apply to what’s called a “Public Interest Premises”. nbn defines this to be “premises used for a public interest purpose including an indigenous community organisation, not-for-profit organisation, educational facility, health facility or local government facility”.

    If you believe you fall under this definition, talk to your service provider about your plan.

  • You must not download, on average, more than 200Gb during one calendar month.

    You must not upload, on average, more than 60Gb of data during one calendar month.

    You may be sent a warning, your connection slowed to 256kb/s for both uploads and downloads (enough for email and very basic web browsing, and not much else), or your connection cut off entirely.

  • More information

    Contact your service provider for more information around the Fair Use Policy in place for your service, or if you believe the Fair Use Policy has been unfairly applied.

    Contact the Tech Hub if you need help with restrictions applied under the Fair Use Policy for your service.