The Sandvine research shows that, in Europe, real-time entertainment continues a steady climb, rising to 33.2% of peak aggregate traffic, up from 31.9% last Autumn.
BitTorrent, a peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing protocol, is the largest single component of both upstream (59.7%) and downstream (21.6%) internet traffic during peak periods.
In the UK, meanwhile, the BBC's iPlayer accounts for 6.6% of peak of downstream traffic, which Sandvine says reflects the demand for localised content in many markets.
Overall, says the study, individual subscribers in Europe consume twice the amount of data as North Americans.
In North America, meanwhile Netflix is now accounting for 29.7% of peak downstream traffic and has become the largest source of internet traffic overall.
And in Latin America, researchers found that social networking (overwhelmingly Facebook) is a bigger source of traffic than YouTube, representing almost 14% of network traffic.
Real-time entertainment in the region, says the firm, represents 27.5% of peak aggregate traffic, still the largest contributor of traffic in Latin America.
Commenting on the report's findings, Dave Caputo, Sandvine's CEO, said that they emphasise the need for innovative solutions to keep up with rapidly evolving consumer demands for content and connectivity.
"The dramatic growth of Netflix and its impending global expansion are prime examples of a growing appetite for real-time entertainment", he said.
"It is also important for fixed and mobile broadband providers to have real-time policy control capability, made possible by insightful business intelligence, in order to put sound strategic decisions into action", he added.