What is Good Latency in Networking?

In the world of networking, speed often takes center stage, but there’s another crucial factor that can make or break your online experience: latency. Whether you're running a business with multiple applications and users or simply enjoying a gaming session at home, understanding and managing latency is key to ensuring smooth, efficient, and frustration-free network performance.

Latency refers to the time it takes for data to travel from one point to another in a network, and it can significantly impact everything from web browsing to video conferencing. But what is good latency? And how does it differ depending on what you're using the network for?

In this article, we’ll dive into the concept of what’s a good latency in networking, exploring why it’s important and what benchmarks you should aim for across various applications. Whether you're a business user looking to optimize your network or a personal user trying to enhance your gaming experience, this guide will help you understand what latency levels are ideal and how to achieve them.

Latency in networking is the delay or time it takes for data to travel from one point in a network to another. Think of it as the time difference between when your device sends a request for information – like loading a webpage or starting a video call – and when it receives the response. This delay, even if it’s just milliseconds, can have a significant impact on the quality and efficiency of your network experience.

Several factors contribute to latency, including the physical distance between devices, network congestion, and the performance of your hardware and software. For example, if you're accessing a server located halfway around the world, the data has to travel a much longer distance, which naturally increases latency. Similarly, a congested network with heavy traffic can slow down data transmission, adding to the delay.

Understanding latency is crucial because it affects everything from how quickly a webpage loads to how smoothly a video call runs. Whether you're managing a business network or simply trying to enjoy seamless online activities at home, knowing what latency is and how it impacts your network is the first step toward optimizing your performance.

Good latency is essential because it directly influences the quality and responsiveness of your network activities. Whether you're managing a large business network or enjoying online gaming at home, low latency ensures that your data travels quickly and efficiently, leading to a smoother, more reliable experience.

For businesses, good latency is critical for maintaining the performance of key applications like VoIP, video conferencing, and cloud services. High latency in these environments can result in delays, poor call quality, and slower application performance, negatively affecting productivity and customer satisfaction. Even a small delay can have significant consequences in competitive industries, making low latency a crucial factor for success.

For personal users, particularly gamers and those using streaming services, good latency is the difference between a seamless experience and one plagued by lag and buffering. In gaming, for instance, low latency is crucial for real-time responsiveness, where every millisecond counts. Similarly, in video streaming, low latency helps ensure that videos play smoothly without interruptions, even in high-definition formats.

Ultimately, good latency is about minimizing delays to create a more responsive and efficient network experience. Whether you’re communicating with clients across the globe, collaborating in real-time with colleagues, or competing in an online game, having good latency ensures that your network can keep up with your demands.

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Yes, low latency is generally considered highly beneficial for most applications, and for a good reason. Low latency means that data can travel quickly across the network, resulting in faster response times and more efficient communication between devices. This is particularly important in scenarios where timing is critical, such as real-time applications, gaming, video conferencing, and interactive services.

The direct correlation between low latency and better performance is evident across various use cases:

• Real-Time Communication: In applications like VoIP and video conferencing, low latency ensures that conversations flow naturally without noticeable delays or echoes. This is crucial for maintaining clear and effective communication, especially in business settings where miscommunication can lead to errors and reduced productivity.
• Online Gaming: In competitive gaming, low latency is essential for quick reflexes and real-time interactions. Gamers rely on low latency to ensure that their actions are registered instantly in the game, giving them a competitive edge and enhancing the overall gaming experience.
• Web Browsing and Streaming: For everyday activities like browsing the web or streaming videos, low latency helps reduce load times and buffering, creating a smoother, more enjoyable experience. Whether you're watching a high-definition video or loading a complex webpage, low latency ensures that you can access content quickly and without interruptions.
• Cloud Applications: In cloud-based environments, low latency allows for faster access to remote servers and services, improving the performance of software as a service (SaaS) applications and other cloud-based tools. This is particularly important for businesses that rely on these tools for their day-to-day operations.

In essence, low latency enhances the overall performance of your network by reducing delays and enabling faster, more responsive interactions. Whether you're a business user needing efficient communication and collaboration tools or a personal user looking for a seamless online experience, low latency is key to achieving optimal network performance.

Higher latency is generally considered detrimental to most network activities, as it leads to slower response times and can significantly degrade the performance of various applications. When latency is high, data takes longer to travel between points in a network, causing delays that can manifest as lag in gaming, buffering in streaming, or poor call quality in VoIP and video conferencing.

Higher latency typically occurs under several conditions:

• Long Physical Distances: When data has to travel across great distances, such as between continents, the increased physical distance naturally results in higher latency.
• Network Congestion: During peak usage times, networks can become congested with traffic, causing delays as data packets wait in line to be transmitted.
• Suboptimal Routing: Sometimes, data may take an indirect path through the network due to routing issues, leading to unnecessary delays.
• Hardware and Software Limitations: Outdated or improperly configured network hardware, as well as software that isn't optimized, can contribute to higher latency.

• Real-Time Applications: In real-time applications like gaming, video conferencing, and remote desktop sessions, high latency can lead to noticeable delays, making interactions frustrating and inefficient. For instance, in a video conference, high latency can cause awkward pauses between speakers, disrupting the flow of conversation.
• Online Gaming: In gaming, particularly competitive or fast-paced games, high latency can put players at a significant disadvantage. The delay in response time can lead to poor gameplay experiences, where actions don’t register in real-time, often referred to as "lag."
• Streaming and Browsing: For streaming and web browsing, higher latency results in slower load times and increased buffering, diminishing the quality of the user experience.

While higher latency is generally undesirable, there are scenarios where slightly elevated latency may be tolerable, depending on the application:

• Non-Critical Tasks: For tasks that don’t require immediate response, such as sending emails or downloading files, slightly higher latency may not have a noticeable impact on user experience.
• Batch Processing: In scenarios where data is processed in large batches, like certain types of data analysis or automated backups, the delay caused by higher latency may not significantly affect overall performance.
• Communication via Text: For applications like email or social media messengers, where communication doesn’t need to happen in real-time, higher latency might not be as disruptive.

In summary, while higher latency is typically harmful to network performance, especially in real-time applications, there are specific scenarios where it may be acceptable. However, minimizing latency wherever possible is key to ensuring a smooth and efficient network experience.

Measuring latency is a crucial step in understanding your network's performance and identifying potential issues. Latency is typically measured in milliseconds (ms) and represents the time it takes for data to travel from one point in a network to another and back. The lower the latency, the faster the response time, which is why regular latency measurements are essential for maintaining optimal network performance.

There are several methods and tools you can use to measure latency:

1. Ping Command:

The most common and straightforward way to measure latency is by using the ping command. When you ping a specific server or device, your computer sends a small data packet to that destination and waits for a response. The time it takes for the packet to make the round trip is your latency.

• How to Use: Open a command prompt or terminal, type ping followed by the IP address or domain name of the server you want to test, and press Enter. The results will show the round-trip time in milliseconds for each packet sent.

2. Traceroute:

Traceroute is another useful tool for measuring latency, especially if you want to see how data travels through the network. It not only measures the time it takes for data to reach each hop (or point) along the way but also helps identify where delays might be occurring.

• How to Use: In the command prompt or terminal, type tracert (Windows) or traceroute (Linux/Mac) followed by the IP address or domain name, and press Enter. The output will display each hop and its corresponding latency.

3. Network Monitoring Tools:

These tools provide real-time insights into network performance, including latency across different parts of your network. They often offer more advanced features like latency history, alerts for high latency, and visualizations that help you understand latency patterns.

For more detailed and continuous latency measurements, a tool like Obkio network performance monitoring is perfect to use:

• Real-Time Latency Monitoring: Quickly identify and address latency issues with proactive, real-time monitoring. Detect delays across your network and implement proactive measures to enhance performance.
• Seamless Setup: Begin monitoring your network with ease using Obkio’s straightforward setup process. Forget about complex configurations or prolonged installations – start tracking your network's performance within minutes.
• In-Depth Analytics: Gain detailed insights into your network's performance metrics. Obkio offers a thorough analysis of propagation delay, transmission delay, processing delay, and queueing delay, helping you make well-informed decisions.
• Efficient Issue Resolution: Quickly detect and resolve latency problems. Obkio’s network performance monitoring tool provides the essential data for effective troubleshooting and resolution of network performance issues.

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4. Third-Party Online Tools:

There are also various online tools available that can measure latency by testing your connection to different servers around the world. These tools are typically easy to use and provide quick results, though they may lack the depth and continuous monitoring that dedicated tools offer.

• How to Use: Simply visit the website of the tool, select a server to test against, and run the latency test. Results will show your latency in milliseconds.

For those looking to delve deeper into this topic (Latency Formula, How to Calculate Latency and more), it's worthwhile to read our full blog post on How to Measure Latency, where we explore more tools and methods in greater detail.

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Measuring good latency involves more than just running a ping test or using a network and latency monitoring tool – it’s about understanding the benchmarks and standards that define what "good" latency looks like for different applications and network environments. The concept of "good latency" varies depending on the specific use case, industry standards, and user expectations.

General Benchmarks for Good Latency

While specific benchmarks can vary, the following general guidelines can help you assess whether your latency is within an acceptable range:

• Less than 20ms: Ideal for most real-time applications, such as gaming, VoIP, and video conferencing. At this level, interactions feel instantaneous, and there’s minimal delay.
• 20ms to 50ms: Still considered good latency for most online activities, including streaming and web browsing. There may be a slight delay, but it’s typically imperceptible to users.
• 50ms to 100ms: Acceptable latency for some applications, though users may start to notice a delay, especially in real-time communications and fast-paced gaming.
• 100ms to 200ms: This range is where latency becomes more noticeable and can start to impact user experience, particularly in interactive applications.
• Above 200ms: Latency at this level is generally considered poor and can significantly hinder performance, leading to frustration and inefficiency.

Typical Latency Ranges

Latency can vary significantly depending on several factors, including your geographic location, the type of connection you’re using (fibre, cable, DSL, etc.), and the quality of your network infrastructure. Here are some typical latency ranges based on connection type:

1. Fibre Optic: Typically offers the lowest latency, often under 20ms, due to its high-speed data transmission capabilities.
2. Cable: Latency is generally between 20ms and 50ms, depending on network congestion and the quality of the infrastructure.
3. DSL: Often has higher latency, ranging from 50ms to 100ms, especially over longer distances.

Networking Monitoring Tool + Thresholds

Understanding and managing latency thresholds on your own can be challenging. This is where a reliable network monitoring tool becomes invaluable. Obkio's tool continuously monitors network latency for you, automatically sending alerts when latency levels exceed the "good" thresholds you've set.

With Obkio, you can choose preset latency thresholds or easily configure them to fit your network's needs. When latency surpasses these thresholds, Obkio not only alerts you but also assists in troubleshooting the root cause of the issue, ensuring that you can address problems before they impact your network's performance.

Latency requirements can vary widely depending on the type of application in use. Different applications have different thresholds for what is considered "good" latency, and understanding these thresholds is crucial for optimizing network performance. Below, we’ll explore the latency requirements for several common applications, explaining how latency impacts their functionality and user experience.

• Recommended Latency: For a seamless web browsing experience, latency should ideally be below 100ms. This ensures that webpages load quickly and interactions with online content are smooth and responsive.
• Impact on User Experience: High latency in web browsing can result in slow-loading pages, unresponsive elements, and a generally frustrating user experience. While not as latency-sensitive as some other applications, maintaining low latency still contributes to a more efficient and enjoyable browsing experience.

• Acceptable Latency for Clear Communication: Latency should be kept under 150ms to ensure clear and natural-sounding conversations without noticeable delays or echoes. For video conferencing, similar latency thresholds apply to avoid lag and maintain smooth video quality.
• Effects on Call Quality and Delays: Higher latency in VoIP and video conferencing can lead to delays in speech, making conversations awkward and difficult to follow. In business environments, this can hinder effective communication and collaboration.

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• Required Latency for SaaS and Cloud Services: Latency under 100ms is typically required for most cloud-based applications, such as CRM systems, file storage, and other SaaS tools, to function efficiently.
• User Productivity and Application Performance: Higher latency can slow down access to cloud resources, leading to delays in data retrieval, slower application performance, and decreased user productivity.

• Ideal Latency for Tools like Microsoft Teams, Slack, and Google Workspace: For effective real-time collaboration, latency should ideally be below 100ms. This ensures that messages, file transfers, and collaborative activities happen in near real-time.
• Impact on Real-Time Collaboration and File Sharing: High latency can disrupt the flow of communication in collaboration tools, leading to delays in message delivery, slow file uploads/downloads, and an overall decrease in team efficiency.

• Latency Requirements for Smooth Remote Access: Remote desktop applications and virtualization tools require latency under 100ms to ensure smooth and responsive interaction. Anything higher can result in noticeable lag when typing, clicking, or navigating within the remote environment.
• Impact on User Interaction and Task Execution: High latency in remote desktop environments can make the user interface feel sluggish and unresponsive, which can be particularly frustrating for tasks that require precision and speed.

• Optimal Latency for SD, HD, and 4K Streaming: For standard definition (SD) video, latency under 200ms is generally acceptable. However, for high definition (HD) and 4K video streaming, latency should be kept below 100ms to prevent buffering and maintain high video quality.
• Buffering and Quality Considerations: Higher latency in video streaming can lead to frequent buffering, reduced video quality, and a poor viewing experience. For live streaming, lower latency is crucial to minimize delays between the broadcast and the viewer.

• What Latency is Good for Gaming: Competitive online gaming requires latency below 50ms to ensure that player actions are registered in real-time without lag. For casual gaming, latency up to 100ms may still provide a decent experience.
• Impact on Gameplay and Responsiveness: High latency in gaming can result in delayed inputs, missed actions, and a lack of synchronization with other players, often leading to frustration and a disadvantage in competitive scenarios.

Achieving good latency in a network requires understanding the various factors that can influence latency levels. These factors can originate from both the network infrastructure itself and external conditions. By identifying and addressing these factors, you can optimize your network’s performance and ensure that latency remains within acceptable ranges.

1. Network Infrastructure

The design and quality of your network infrastructure play a crucial role in determining latency. Several components within the infrastructure can impact how quickly data travels across the network:

• Bandwidth: Higher bandwidth allows more data to be transmitted simultaneously, reducing congestion and improving latency. However, bandwidth alone doesn’t guarantee low latency if other factors are not optimized.
• Switches and Routers: The performance of your network switches and routers can significantly affect latency. Older or underpowered devices may struggle to process data quickly, leading to delays.
• Wired vs. Wireless Connections: Wired connections typically offer lower latency compared to wireless ones, which can be affected by signal interference, distance from the router, and other environmental factors.

2. Physical Distance and Routing

The physical distance between devices and the route data takes across the network can greatly influence latency:

• Distance: The greater the distance between the source and destination of the data, the higher the latency. This is particularly relevant in global networks where data might need to travel across continents.
• Routing Paths: Data packets don’t always take the most direct route to their destination. If a packet must traverse multiple network nodes or make detours due to routing policies, latency can increase. Routing inefficiencies can be addressed by optimizing the network’s topology and using advanced routing protocols.

3. Network Congestion

Network congestion occurs when there is more data traffic on the network than it can handle efficiently, leading to increased latency:

• Traffic Load: High volumes of traffic, especially during peak usage times, can overload network devices, causing delays. Prioritizing traffic for critical applications and implementing Quality of Service (QoS) policies can help manage congestion.
• Contention: On shared networks, such as those in large office buildings or apartment complexes, multiple users competing for the same resources can lead to increased latency. This is common in Wi-Fi networks where many devices are connected to the same access point.

4. Hardware and Configuration

The hardware you use and how it is configured can also have a significant impact on latency:

• Outdated Hardware: Using outdated network equipment, such as old modems, routers, or switches, can increase latency as these devices may not handle modern data loads effectively.
• Device Configuration: Misconfigured devices, such as routers with improper settings, can introduce unnecessary delays. Ensuring that your network devices are correctly configured and regularly updated can help maintain low latency.

5. Internet Service Provider (ISP)

Your ISP’s network quality and configuration can affect your latency:

• Peering and Interconnects: ISPs use peering agreements to route traffic between networks. If your ISP has poor peering arrangements or congested interconnects, it can lead to higher latency, especially when accessing resources outside their network.
• Type of Connection: The type of internet connection provided by your ISP (fiber, cable, DSL, satellite) influences latency. For example, satellite connections generally have higher latency due to the long distances data must travel to and from the satellite.

6. Environmental Factors

Environmental conditions can sometimes influence network latency, particularly in wireless networks:

• Interference: Wireless signals can be disrupted by physical obstacles (like walls), electronic devices, and even weather conditions. Reducing interference by optimizing the placement of wireless access points and minimizing obstructions can help improve latency.
• Temperature and Power Supply: Extreme temperatures and unstable power supplies can affect network equipment performance, potentially increasing latency. Ensuring a stable environment for your network hardware is essential for maintaining good latency.

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Before diving into troubleshooting, it's essential to verify that latency is actually causing your network issues. Start by replicating the problem and closely monitoring your network’s performance to precisely assess the severity of the issue.

For instance, if you experience frequent freezing or pixelation during video calls, you can run a network performance test to determine if high latency is the underlying cause.

Once you've confirmed that latency is the issue, you can begin implementing solutions. One effective approach is using an agent-based tool like Obkio Network Performance Monitoring, which continuously tracks your network performance and measures latency between different points within your network.

With Obkio, you can swiftly detect even minor latency issues across your network and gather the critical data needed to resolve them.

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To effectively troubleshoot network latency issues, the first step is deploying Network Monitoring Agents in strategic locations within your network, such as offices, data centers, and cloud environments. These agents work by continuously exchanging synthetic traffic and measuring key network metrics like latency between each other.

If a particular office location is experiencing connectivity issues, you can install local agents at that site to pinpoint whether latency is the culprit. These local agents, compatible with operating systems like MacOS, Windows, and Linux, allow you to identify specific network segments where latency is most severe.

In addition to local agents, deploying a public monitoring agent over the Internet is essential for comprehensive troubleshooting. Managed by a network performance monitoring tool like Obkio, this agent can help you quickly determine whether the latency issue is widespread or isolated to a specific destination. Using agents from providers like AWS or Google Cloud is particularly effective for this purpose.

With these Network Monitoring Agents in place, you can monitor latency between various points in your network – whether it’s between your head office and the Google Cloud or between the Google Cloud and your data center. The data collected through these agents provides the crucial insights needed to troubleshoot and resolve latency issues, ensuring your network operates smoothly and efficiently. If a sudden spike in latency is detected, you can set up network alerts to notify you right away, enabling a quick response.

This is where Obkio's troubleshooting features truly excel:

1. Obkio Vision: Visual Traceroute Tool

Once high latency is detected, the next step is to pinpoint the exact location of the slowdown. Obkio Vision, a powerful visual traceroute tool, acts as your network detective, tracing the path your data travels and identifying any bottlenecks along the way. By examining this visual map, you can determine whether the latency spikes are occurring within your network or are related to your service provider.

2. Network Device Monitoring:

Sometimes, the cause of latency might be hidden within your network hardware. Obkio's device monitoring features enable you to dig deeper by assessing the performance of firewalls, switches, routers, and other network devices. This helps you uncover local issues, such as high bandwidth usage or overloaded CPUs, that may be contributing to latency problems.

3. Quality of Service (QoS) Monitoring:

Think of a busy highway with no dedicated lanes for emergency vehicles – chaotic and inefficient. Similarly, a network without proper QoS configuration can cause delays for critical applications. Obkio lets you review and fine-tune your QoS settings, ensuring that essential traffic, such as video conferencing or VoIP calls, gets the priority it needs, thereby reducing latency issues for these vital activities.

By integrating continuous monitoring, visual traceroutes, device inspections, and QoS configuration reviews, Obkio equips you with the tools to effectively troubleshoot the root causes of high latency and maintain a smooth, responsive network experience.

Looking to explore more about troubleshooting latency? Check out our article, "The Fast and the Frustrated: A Guide to Troubleshooting and How to Improve Latency", where we break down a detailed 3-step process to help you quickly identify and resolve latency issues.

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In today's connected world, ensuring good latency is crucial for maintaining a seamless and efficient network experience, whether for business applications or personal use. We've explored what good latency means across various scenarios, why it's important, and how to measure and troubleshoot it effectively. From understanding latency basics to diving deep into application-specific requirements, the key takeaway is that managing latency is essential for optimizing performance and user experience.

By leveraging tools like Obkio, you can proactively monitor, diagnose, and resolve latency issues before they impact your operations. Whether you're dealing with video conferencing, gaming, or cloud applications, keeping latency in check ensures that your network runs smoothly and your users remain satisfied.

As you move forward, remember that good latency is not just about maintaining numbers within a certain range – it's about delivering reliable, high-quality experiences for all network users. Keep these insights in mind as you continue to fine-tune your network for optimal performance.

Ready to take control of your network latency? Choose Obkio as your go-to latency monitoring and troubleshooting tool and enjoy a faster, more responsive network today.