Chorus had looked at Nielsen research for Manukau to try to understand why it's the highest use area in the country.
Nelson said Manukau is made up of 70 per cent families with a young population and extended families likely living at home.
"These are families who are managing a whole lot of commitments and as a result they prioritise what they can do at home rather than going out," Nelson said.
"The ability to be able to do things online becomes very important."
Kaikoura and Thames-Coromandel District had the lowest average use per household per month, 49 gigabytes. Thirteen districts used over 100 gigabytes on average per household per month: Manukau, North Shore, Waitakere, Papakura, Auckland, Franklin, Porirua, Wellington, Lower Hutt, Upper Hutt, Palmerston North, Rotorua and Dunedin.
"We measure the amount of data coming across our network because we have to plan for the amount of capacity we're going to need for the future," Nelson said.
The average amount of data used per household per month is expected to continue to grow to 170 gigabytes by June, and 680 gigabytes per month by June 2020.
"If people have higher speeds they have a better experience so they use more.
"We can see that fibre users are using about twice as much as users on copper. So they're really making the most of that additional capability."
The average connection speed has increased at varying rates around the country. Nelson said Chorus' data on speed increase was compromised by the fact some the areas, like Tauranga and Whangarei, had fibre provided by other network operators.
However, Nelson said people get frustrated by having to wait for TV streams to buffer, but could be on a better connection.
"We know between 58 per cent and 63 per cent of people could be on better broadband than what they're on today."
