On sleepless nights – instead of counting sheep – online gamers wonder how to reduce PING. Although this concept is important for all network users, few could provide its definition. So, what exactly is PING?
To start, a little movie trivia for those with a sense of humor. The word PING gained popularity in the 1980s thanks to the film “Monty Python’s Life of Brian.” A crazy group of comedians created a machine that goes PING and featured it in one of the roles in their scathing satire. We refer you to the film for details, as it’s worth it. Nowadays, the career of the term PING relates to the Internet and is as important for online gamers as it is for users browsing websites.
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What is PING?
When explaining PING, we will try to avoid the jargon of computer network diagnosticians, for whom this concept is like breakfast brought to work – everyday routine. PING defines the response speed in internet connections. If your PING is, for example, 155, it means that when playing FIFA, you will see your opponent’s movements with a delay of 155 milliseconds. The higher the PING, the greater this delay will be. This is why it is so important (at least for gamers) for PING, i.e., the response speed from another computer, to be as low as possible.
However, this exact same principle matters when browsing websites. The higher the PING, the more “sluggish” the computer’s operation – websites open so slowly that you could fry an egg in the meantime. Now you can go to your company’s network diagnostician and surprise them with your knowledge, demanding an immediate reduction in PING. You can be sure that their face will show astonishment.
What is a good PING?
Now, a bit more technically. Network management commands use PING to check the stability of connections between a computer and the server to which a query has been sent. You can also do this yourself. First, you will need to launch the system’s command prompt. There, you need to type the PING command followed by the address of the domain you are interested in. In response, you will receive information about transmission delays, as well as about the sent and received internet packets. If you have an internet connection using fiber optic technology, your PING will be minimal. Its value will also be influenced by whether the servers you are pinging are located in the same country where the measurement is being taken. In that case, it can be as low as one or two milliseconds.
If your PING is 350 milliseconds, you can forget about success in online games. In that case, it’s better to look for an answer to the question of how to reduce PING. Please note – delays in games are not necessarily caused solely by high PING. There can be many more reasons, such as your hardware capabilities and installed drivers. However, it’s worth eliminating them one by one, checking first how to improve PING.
How to reduce PING?
If you are just starting your career as an online whiz and want to become a network killer, you should aim for a PING of no more than 20 milliseconds. This is a value for which delays are practically imperceptible. At 50 ms, it will also be very good. But remember, you want to compete with the best, and they have already mastered the PING issue long ago. If you have a delay of around a hundred milliseconds, you can forget about a career as the fastest killer in online shooters. Why? Before you make any move, your opponent will be in a completely different place. To eliminate such surprises, check the delay information in the in-game menu while playing or use the command we provided earlier.
What should you do to reduce PING? Check the quality of your internet connection, ask whoever needs to be asked about network performance. If you are using a fiber optic connection, PING is probably not going to be your problem. If it’s a mobile connection in a location where internet network transmitters are heavily loaded, then delay differences can change like on an amplitude.
Geography also affects PING. And no, it’s not about whether you know the capitals of all the countries in East Asia. What matters is simply the distance between your computer and the servers you are connecting to. When playing online, the closest server is chosen by default, but it doesn’t always work perfectly. If you experience connection delays, check the game settings to see if you are playing in the correct region for your location.
Server response acceleration is also possible in the simplest way possible, by restarting the devices you are using. Turn off your router or modem for a while, and the PING problems that suddenly appeared should disappear. And you won’t need a machine that goes PING for that.
