Test Your Internet Speed

A speed test is the best way to determine how fast your internet is. It only takes a minute, and it’s important to follow the instructions to get an accurate result. All your connected devices share the internet speed delivered to your home, so you need to disconnect other devices from the internet before you conduct the test. Also, sluggish background apps can interfere with the test, so close any open applications on your computer. To run the test, plug your computer directly into your router or modem and turn off the wireless connection on your computer to get the most accurate reading of your internet speed. Now you’re ready to conduct a test and discover your real-time upload, download, jitter, and ping speeds.

Jitter measures the variation in the response time. It technically means packet delay variation. A data packet is a segment of data that travels over a network path. You could compare it to a car driving on a highway. A website consists of a collection of data packets that travel from a server over a network to your computer. Jitter explains the time delay between the data packets over the network, and it’s measured in milliseconds (ms). A smaller number is better because it means the data packets are traveling over the network path in a consistent way. When that number is high, data packets arrive inconsistently. You could think of jitter like a traffic jam. The data packets can pile up, then arrive all at once, which can overload the device and cause data not to load.

Ping measures how quickly your server responds to a request. Also called latency, it measures the round-trip time for a response. Like jitter, ping is measured in milliseconds (ms). The faster the ping, the more responsive your connection. A fast ping is especially important for gaming and other applications where timing is critical. As with jitter, a smaller number is better.

A jitter speed less than 20 ms is optimal. If jitter exceeds 30 ms, it will impact your voice and video calls and online streaming and gaming. A ping speed less than 50 ms is very good. Generally, you’ll notice delays if the ping speed exceeds 150 ms.

Upload and download speeds are measured in Mbps, which stands for megabits per second. For these measurements, a higher number is better. You can think of Mbps like horsepower in a car. The more Mbps, the faster your internet speed. According to the FCC’s household broadband guide, advanced internet users need download speeds exceeding 25 Mbps and upload speeds exceeding 3 Mbp. However, if your household uses more than four devices at a time — and if anyone games, streams high-definition (HD) movies, or uses other high-demand applications — you’ll need much faster speeds to ensure maximum dependability and responsiveness.