Ideal Internet speed is one of the most talked-about topics with regard to online gaming. No amount of skill and talent will allow you to do well in a game if there is so much lag you can barely move.
Even games like online bingo need a great internet connection, so you never miss a number. This post will talk about the ideal internet speed for online gaming, as well as what you can do to improve yours.
Download and Upload Speed
The simple answer to the question is 20Mbps and yes it’s enough to stream your games. This should be the minimum internet speed to ensure you don’t lag in most games. However, for more data-heavy games, like League of Legends or even Warzone, you will want a faster connection.
Quick download speeds are great, but they are also only half the equation. Considering you are inputting information from a controller or keyboard, your upload speed needs to keep up as well.
While your upload speed doesn’t need to be close to as fast as your download speed, you will need an upload speed of 0.5Mbps and above. This is more than sufficient to handle the data you will be sending to the game.
What Affects Latency?
Two main aspects that affect latency when gaming, the location of the servers you are trying to connect to and the type of internet connection you are using. The first aspect is relatively self-explanatory.
The physical location of servers has a huge impact on your internet speed. If you are in South Africa and trying to connect to a server in the UK, you will experience lag and latency spikes as the server is just too far away.
Many people use WiFi to play online, but WiFi is famously weaker than a simple ethernet connection. An ethernet connection is much more stable and is less likely to have spikes and latency drops.
How to Avoid Lag
Apart from using an ethernet connection to help with our internet connection, you can do some other things to improve your internet speed. The first is to simply turn off all your other devices that are using your internet.
Tablets, smartphones, etc., all draw a lot of internet power constantly, and just switching these devices off will make a noticeable difference from the get-go. Streaming also uses far more internet than you might expect.
If you are a live streamer, you will need to upgrade your internet to something much quicker than the 20Mbps recommended. The next thing you can use is a VPN, but we will discuss that a little bit later.
How to Speed Up Your Internet
There are several checks and updates you can do to help speed up your internet connection. The first is quite simple, but also something that may not be possible. Avoiding peak internet hours is a great way to avoid lag spikes.
While it just isn’t possible for some to play during work hours or late at night, it is a strategy to give yourself the best chance at a strong and fast internet connection. Refreshing your router is also an easy way to get an improvement.
If you turn it off once a month and give it some time to reset, there is a chance you will see a noticeable improvement. If you don’t want to use an ethernet connection, consider repositioning your router.
How often have you gone into a house and seen the router in a random corner of the house? The position of the router can make a big difference in connection strength, even between rooms that are next to each other.
Benefits of a VPN – Ideal Internet Speed
There is a slight misconception about a VPN’s impact on your internet speed. Some are under the impression that a VPN will speed up your internet, what it does is still great, but it’s not speeding up your internet.
A VPN will allow you to connect to a server that is closer to you, giving you the speed improvement we spoke about earlier. This means that it isn’t speeding up your internet but instead connecting you to the best and fastest server.
