Latency (Ping)

What It Means

Latency is the round-trip time (RTT) for a data packet to travel from your device to a target server and back, measured in milliseconds. It is the single most important metric for real-time applications: competitive online gaming requires under 50 ms for reliable play, professional video calls degrade noticeably above 150 ms, and VoIP quality suffers above 300 ms. Typical latency by technology: fiber 1 to 5 ms to the local exchange, cable 10 to 30 ms, DSL 20 to 50 ms, 5G fixed wireless 25 to 50 ms, Starlink LEO satellite 20 to 40 ms, and traditional HughesNet or Viasat GEO satellite 600 ms or higher. Latency has several components that add up: the physical propagation delay governed by the speed of light (roughly 5 microseconds per kilometer in fiber), processing delay at routers and switches, queueing delay during congestion, and modulation delay specific to the access technology. Cable modem DOCSIS framing alone adds 8 to 12 ms baseline latency, while fiber GPON framing adds roughly 1 to 2 ms. Latency cannot be improved by buying a higher speed tier from the same provider, a 2 Gbps plan has the same latency as a 100 Mbps plan on the same network. The FCC Broadband Nutrition Label now requires ISPs to disclose typical latency. The Broadband Grade does not currently weight latency directly but uses it in speed test diagnostics.

Frequently Asked Questions