Internet speed ≠ bandwidth? 99% of people have been misled by these concepts

Everyone has had such moments: opening a web page and it keeps spinning, scrolling through videos and watching live broadcasts is always delayed.



"What's going on? Didn't I upgrade to 500 Mbps bandwidth?"



Don't worry, maybe you are just confused by a few keywords. Network speed, bandwidth, download speed, delay, packet loss... these sound similar, but they are actually different. And confusing them is the root cause of your "slow feeling".


1. The concept of bandwidth and network speed
1. What is bandwidth?
Bandwidth, in English, essentially refers to how much data can be transmitted per unit time. You can think of it as the width of a road:

100Mbps = 100 megabits per second
1000Mbps = 1Gbps = Gigabit bandwidth
The wider the road (the greater the bandwidth), the more data can theoretically pass through at the same time.


But this is just "ability", not "experience".

2. What is Internet speed?

There is no unified standard for the word "Internet speed". The Internet speed you are talking about may be:

Download speed: For example, you download files at 30MB per second.
Web page opening speed: refers to the response speed.
Latency (Ping value): The "how many ms" you see when playing games.
Streaming experience: whether the video will be stuck and whether the clarity will change.


Therefore, "slow Internet speed" may be caused by many reasons, and may not be directly related to bandwidth.

2. FAQ
1. Does the greater the bandwidth, the faster the Internet speed?
Not necessarily. If your Internet is like a highway, the bandwidth is the number of lanes, but the speed depends on the following factors:


Is there a speed limit on the car (server speed limit)
Is there a traffic jam ahead (network congestion)
Is the car fast (device performance)
Are there potholes on the road (packet loss or interference)
How far is the destination (network path, delay)
If you have a 10-lane road, it will be useless if no one is moving, the road is bad, and there are too many traffic lights.


2. A real conversion misunderstanding
Many people hear "500 Mbps" and subconsciously think that they can download at 500MB/s. In fact, this is just an illusion.

Bandwidth uses bits, while download tools use bytes, 1 Byte = 8 bits.

So: 500 Mbps ÷ 8 = 62.5 MB/s

That is, the theoretical maximum download speed of 500 Mbps is 62.5MB/s.



If you can achieve 50MB/s when downloading a large file, it is actually very good.

3. Why does the network speed "feel slow"?

Here are the most common reasons:

Your device only supports 100M: For example, an old router, network or network card cannot run up to 1G.

You are connected to 2.4GHz Wi-Fi: It is subject to large interference and has a low speed limit. It is recommended to use 5GHz.


The server limits the rate: For example, video websites deliberately control the rate to save bandwidth costs.
Too many devices on the same network: Multiple devices compete for bandwidth at the same time, which seems to be sufficient bandwidth, but it is slow after sharing.
The line exit is crowded or there are too many transfer hops: Especially when accessing foreign content, the delay is high and the number of routing hops is large.