AT&T has recently announced that they are planning to limit the quality of video on mobile data for their customers in 2017. This new feature is called Stream Saver and it will throttle the quality of the video to DVD resolution of around 480p.
Although the feature might seem remotely useful for users with limited data plans, however, AT&T plans to release the feature for even customers with unlimited data plans. To make matters more complicated, the Stream Saver will be enabled by default.
AT&T will notify all their customers once the feature is active and will also provide instructions for how to turn it off or on again, depending on their preferences and needs. It is unclear why AT&T would release such a feature unless they want to save as much as data as possible while still charging consumers for full which have unlimited data plans.
One very remote benefit of the Stream Saver for unlimited data plans is that AT&T has reserved its right to throttle the unlimited data for users who exceed 22 GB per month. After that “limit” they will be connected to a congested cell tower. The Stream Saver will allow the customers to avoid surpassing that amount of data.
Nonetheless, the feature does provide more options and flexibility to users. The fact that the company will notify customers and provide instructions how to disable it is also a plus. It’s good to have options in case you need them even if you may never end up using Stream Saver. AT&T won’t charge you for switching the service on and off multiple times.
For customers with multi-line accounts, the feature can be turned on or off for specific lines and not others. Additionally, disabling Stream Saver will not be a temporary setting. The preferences of users will be saved until they decide to change it again. Stream Saver will be available to users of both AT&T’s postpaid plans and the GoPhone prepaid plans.
A useful reminder about the feature is that it will only be enabled on mobile data. The app will not be enabled when you are on Wi-Fi network.
Are you an AT&T customer? What do you think about the new Stream Saver feature?
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