How this speed test works
Download is measured against Cloudflare's speed-test network, which serves the data from the edge location nearest to you, so distance to the server is rarely the bottleneck. The test fetches progressively larger blocks (1 MB up to 25 MB) and reports the average throughput, dropping the slowest warm-up sample. Upload posts random data to our own server in increasing sizes up to 4 MB. Ping is the average of five small round-trips to the Cloudflare edge, excluding the worst one.
Everything runs in the browser — no Flash, Java or app install. Your results are kept in this browser's local storage only (see the history card above), so you can compare over days without an account and nothing is sent to us apart from the upload test data itself, which is discarded.
Getting an accurate reading
- Use an Ethernet cable if you want to test the line rather than your Wi-Fi.
- Pause downloads, cloud backups, streaming on other devices and the VPN (unless you are testing the VPN).
- Run it three times and look at the middle value; single runs vary.
- Test at different times of day — evening congestion is the most common cause of "my plan says 500 Mbps but I get 120".
- This test uses a single connection, so on very fast lines (500 Mbps+) it reads lower than multi-stream tools; use it for trends and for anything under that.
If results are lower than your plan
- Wi-Fi is the usual culprit. 2.4 GHz tops out around 50–100 Mbps in practice; move closer or use 5 GHz.
- Old routers and powerline adapters bottleneck well below modern plans.
- Check whether another device is saturating the line (the ping test will show high or erratic latency).
- ISPs quote "up to" speeds measured to their own network; a 10–20% gap to third-party servers is normal, 50%+ is worth a support call.
- To check for throttling of specific services, compare the speed of a large download with and without a VPN: if the VPN is consistently faster, traffic shaping is likely.
Frequently asked questions
Why is my upload so much slower than download?
Most cable and DSL plans are asymmetric by design — the ISP allocates more channels to download because that is what most households use. Fibre plans are usually symmetric. It is not a fault unless the upload is far below what your plan states.
What is a good ping?
Under 20 ms is excellent, 20–50 ms is normal for fixed broadband, 50–100 ms is fine for everything except competitive gaming, and above 150 ms video calls start to feel delayed. Satellite and some mobile connections are naturally higher.
Why do I get different numbers on other speed tests?
Server location, number of parallel streams and test duration all differ between tools. ISP-hosted tests are usually the highest because the server sits inside their network. Use the same tool consistently when comparing over time.
Does the test use a lot of data?
About 46 MB of download and 7 MB of upload per run, regardless of your speed. That is fine on broadband; avoid running it repeatedly on a metered mobile plan.
How much does a VPN slow down the internet?
With a modern WireGuard-based VPN and a server in your region, expect 5–15% less download speed and 5–20 ms extra ping. Distant servers, OpenVPN over TCP and busy free tiers can halve your speed. See our guide and measure it here before and after connecting.