Data usage descrepencies between Firewalla Gold and Xfinity...

July 17, 2022 19:52

Firewalla Gold says my data usage is at ~657 GB, Xfinity says it's at ~266 GB. Xfinity has had a lower number since I started using my firewalla router. Is anyone else seeing this? I'm using it as my router. Last month FG measured ~834 GB and Xfinity was at ~400 GB. Thanks.

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13 comments

Firewalla

July 17, 2022 21:10
Does your monthly dates start (under the monthly data plan feature) with the same date as the Xfinity? Are you in router mode?
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Wes Thurmond

July 17, 2022 21:32
Both start on the first of each month. Yes I'm in router mode.
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Wes Thurmond

July 17, 2022 21:44
Here are a few screen shots. I got my firewalla gold around the middle of April of this year.
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Firewalla

July 17, 2022 22:38
Assume your first date of bandwidth usage is the same in Firewalla and Comcast, did you significantly decrease internet usage? just looking at april and June month, the difference is a 50% decrease usage. While I think Firewalla recorded usage is the same ...

So will there be a possibility that Comcast is undercounting?
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Wes Thurmond

July 17, 2022 22:52

Edited
It could be Comcast undercounting. I haven't really decreased usage, I don't think. Biggest consumers are game downloads and streaming services. The first three days of July, I downloaded 180 GB in new games and Comcast only showed around 50 GB usage for that period even after waiting the 24 hours they say it could take for usage to update.
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Wes Thurmond

July 17, 2022 23:02
In May I also stopped using my Netgear orbi for access points and started using a ubiquiti switch with ubiquiti access points.
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Firewalla

July 17, 2022 23:11

Edited
At the moment, I think Xfinity may have some funky accounting for sure. Maybe they give free downloads or something.
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Wes Thurmond

July 17, 2022 23:17
One other weird thing is when I switched to firewalla as my router My download speeds increased from consistently around ~750 down to consistently ~890. My uploads didn't really change though.
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Wes Thurmond

July 17, 2022 23:18
Not complaining, just weird. :-)
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Firewalla

July 18, 2022 17:40
The Firewalla hardware (all of them) are likely much/much more powerful than your average consumer hardware. And by breaking WiFi and routing/filtering, you also optimized the data path to be a lot more efficient
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David Rothenberger

July 19, 2022 19:21
I have Xfinity with cable. We have a main DVR and a satellite box in another room. That satellite box connects via WiFi and basically streams its content, similar to the way a browser would using their Stream service.

That WiFi traffic is counted by Firewalla, but is not counted by Comcast. This causes a discrepancy for me where Firewalla shows more traffic than Comcast.

Perhaps that is also what you're seeing?
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Wes Thurmond

July 19, 2022 19:44

Edited
Maybe, I primarily use an Xbox for games and streaming. I use a cable to connect it to my primary switch instead of wifi. In this example ( https://help.firewalla.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/7858285134099/comments/7860803025299 ) I verified the game download sizes in the MS store afterwards and the total was over 100GB still far above the Xfinity recorded ~50GB
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Wes Thurmond

August 26, 2022 15:01
It looks it was an xfinity issue and it's been fixed now. There is a ~20GB discrepancy that started the first of this month, but aside from that the internet data usage numbers between firewalla and xfinity are in line.
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