Why does ping matter

For information specifically applicable to users in the European Economic Area, please click here. What is ping and how does it impact professional gaming? A powerful gaming experience that eliminates lag, jitter, and buffering in gaming requires more than just a fast internet connection. Physical distance to the server, connection speed, networking equipment connected to the internet, the number of devices sharing the connection, and traffic loads from nearby customers on the network can impact your actual speed.

So, even though you may have an internet plan of 6 Mbps, noise on your network could be driving that down to 1 to 3 Mbps or even lower—especially during peak times. This is unacceptable for professional gamers and Twitch affiliates who run their business around winning tournaments and streaming powerful experiences to fans. This guide will discuss: What is ping in professional gaming? What impacts ping rate? What is a good ping rate for professional gaming?

How can I guarantee a good ping rate for professional gaming? Latency is the time it takes for the system to respond to an action such as pressing a button or moving a joystick. Ping is the actual signal sent out to collect and transfer data from servers. So why does ping matter? Put simply, it determines whether your gaming experience is fun or frustrating. Some popular video games that rely on fast internet connection include Fortnite, Overwatch, Rocket League, and League of Legends.

Slow ping could prevent you from seeing an opponent with enough time to take cover in a split second, meaning you lag a few frames behind and lose a life. So what is the ideal ping level? Ping is measured in milliseconds ms , and the closer your ping is to zero, the better. A ping under 20 ms is very good, and just under ms is average.

If you experience anything above ms, you will detect delays in your gaming experience, such as lagging or freezing. If you are experiencing lagging or slow system performance while gaming, bad ping might be the culprit.

However, there are other issues that could contribute to your sluggish gaming experience. Doing a single ping test gives you an idea of what the one-way trip looks like one time only. Your jitter is a measure of multiple ping tests and shows how much difference there is between each ping test. If you think of latency like a road trip from Melbourne to Sydney and back, then jitter is if you did this same round trip multiple times, recorded how long each trip took, then looked at the overall difference in time each of these trips took.

If each round trip is fairly similar in time i. The reason that latency particularly matters in these instances is because they all happen in real-time. When you shoot at an enemy, success relies on your ability to react quickly and then for that reaction to travel the round trip from your computer to the server and back for your game to record your reaction and hit that enemy.

A high latency round trip means that your game takes longer to register your reaction. A low latency round trip means that little time passes between your reaction and when your game records your reaction, so your chances of success are better. This is why latency may be a more important number for you to use to compare internet providers than internet speed. Sign in. Ping refers to reaction time between your connected device and another device or server.

A larger ping measured in milliseconds equates to a longer lag time. Therefore, lower ping can be ideal. The rubber-banding effect, where, suddenly, an object has jumped from one place to the next due to high latency, can stem from ping speed.

Ping goes hand in hand with fast internet service. The faster the connection between your device, and the device you are communicating with, the lower your ping.