What is latency vs bandwidth?

Do you ever wonder why some video calls lag, even on high-speed internet? 

It’s not just about bandwidth – there’s also latency to consider.  

Bandwidth is the maximum data you can send/receive per second. 

Latency is how quickly one piece of goes out to the internet and returns to your device.  

Think of it like a water pipe in a loop. The diameter of the pipe is like the bandwidth, with a bigger pipe, the more water can flow at a given time. Latency is how long it takes for a single drop of the water to start at the beginning of the loop and return. 

High latency is usually what causes the stuttering of live video and voice calls. High latency is usually a result of your local network rather than how much bandwidth you pay for.  

What can I do? 

1. Distance matters. Make sure your devices are either on a wired connection or are close to your WiFi network radio. 
2. Look for data hogs. When devices are sending and receiving a lot of data, it can congest your local network & increase latency. Most modern firewalls/routers have dashboards that can display data consumption broken down by host.
3. Tweak your setup. Look for “Quality of Service” or QOS settings on your networking equipment and modify those to prioritize the traffic that is most important for your setup.