If you are a gamer, then you already know that the internet you choose for gaming is very important for your experience. From defending your throne in DoTA2 to killing the enemies on the opposing team in Call of Duty or just achieving victory in Tekken from other opponents, it all comes down to how good your internet is. Sure, having a good PC is essential to run online multiplayer games, but again, playing them effectively depends on what kind of internet connection you have. If you are looking for a good internet connection, go for Xfinity Internet for its reliability and wider availability.
In this article, we will tell how exactly the internet speed affects your gameplay.
Download Speed
The download speed of your internet is how much data your internet provides to your PC. Usually, download speeds are in Mbps. So, 3 Mbps means that your internet provides you with 3 megabits per second.
Download speed is very important as it dictates how much data you can get on your PC from the gaming servers. It is recommended to have a plan with at least 6 Mbps if you are an online gamer. However, you may need more speed if you have lots of devices connected to the same internet. If there are multiple devices, the internet speed is distributed to all these devices. So even if you have 6 Mbps speed internet, the other devices might be taking up the internet bandwidth for their online activities such as downloading, streaming Netflix, or even just scrolling Reddit, which will result in your PC getting less data for gaming.
Therefore, you need to choose a plan which not only provides enough speed for gaming but also covers up if more than one device is using the internet at the same time.
Upload Speed
The upload speed is how much data you sent over the internet to the gaming servers. Each time you press a button that corresponds to an action in-game, that data is sent to the server and it is stimulated in the online game across all the players.
While playing Battlefield, once you click the shoot button, it uploads the data to the game server that your character is shooting. The server then transmits this data to all the players in-game with you.
Upload speed, although it is less than download speed, is still as important as the download speed.
Upload speed is even more important if you are a streamer. You not only need to constantly upload input command data in the game server but also you need internet fast enough to upload your video and audio at the same time.
Latency
Latency is the time the data takes to go from one point to another point. If you are gaming online, it can be described as the time it takes for the command input you have put to the time the gaming server receives it.
Latency is very important as it defines your gaming experience. Have you ever played a game and it took time for your character to perform the action? That’s because of latency.
To have a good gaming experience, you need internet which offers low latency. Otherwise, you will be pressing a button but your character will do the action after a delay.
This is very important especially if you take part in competitive gaming, where every second counts. You can have a high download speed internet with high latency. Therefore, you need internet with not only a high download speed but also less latency.
Latency will always be there as it always takes time for data to travel. But by using fiber internet, which offers the fastest internet speeds, the time taken for the data to travel can be cut significantly short.
Ping
Ping in online gaming is the measure of latency. Whenever you play any online multiplayer game, it shows the value of ping which is in milliseconds.
The value of ping refers to how much delay there will be when you send a command in-game to when that command happens. Usually, acceptable ping is considered from 90ms. Good ping is between 15ms to 40ms which is required for competitive gaming where one every second counts.
Ping depends on the distance between your pc and where the game servers are. It is important to choose the server that is closer to your location for a smooth experience.
To improve your ping, you must get internet with low latency. There will be times when your ping will spike up due to weather conditions or due to internet provider system updating or fixing bugs, but generally, the ping will remain constant so a sudden spike in ping doesn’t mean low-quality internet.
Final Thoughts
To sum it up, internet speed is very important for your gameplay. You need internet with good download and upload speed and low latency.