Whether at work, home or on-the-go, majority of us are stuck on our devices for the most part of the day. If you are not working on your office laptop or computer, you are probably scrolling through social media, shopping, listening to your favourite playlist or looking for the next Netflix drama to binge-watch. Now, one thing that you need to perform amongst any or all of these tasks is a reliable internet connection. What if we told you that through a simple network speed test, you could make out how your broadband or mobile internet is performing? That way, you could even compare which one is performing better.

What is an internet speed test?

To simplify it, a network speed test determines the speed at which your device is able to download and upload data using the internet. This test usually takes a couple of points into consideration while assessing your connection.

  • Download speed: This refers to the speed at which your internet connection fetches the information you asked for, from the internet. Usually, this is measured in Mbps or megabytes-per-second.
  • Upload speed: This is the speed at which you can send information to the internet. This is also measured in Mbps.
  • Ping: Ping, or latency, refers to the time that your connection is taking to send and receive data. This is measured in milliseconds.
  • Network jitter: Jitter indicates the variability in the duration between when a signal is transmitted and when it is received. Network jitter is usually an outcome of network congestion.

How to check network speed?

Go to your search engine and search with ‘network speed test’, ‘bandwidth speed test’ or ‘check my internet speed’. You’ll be suggested multiple options for running a speed test, pick one. You can also do this test to assess your mobile internet.

Why should I do a network speed test?

Great question. A lot of times, you sit down with some important tasks and your wifi or mobile internet starts lagging. This could happen because over time, you’ve stored cache files on your system that are slowing it down. Connection can also slow down due to server load, an active VPN connection running on the system. However, unless you are running a network speed test, you wouldn’t know if your broadband speed is slow or if there’s another reason altogether. Even if you want to understand whether your service provider is giving you the internet speed they had promised, you need to run multiple tests at various points of the day and check the result.

What to do if my internet speed is not up to the mark?

In case, you are repeatedly disappointed with your network speed,

  • Switch on and off your modem and router.
  • Make sure that they are centrally located, so as to avoid any interruption.
  • See that your router is compatible with the network plan you’ve chosen. If not, upgrade your router.
  • Change your Wi-Fi password to ensure nobody else is using it without your knowledge.