Do you experience constant lag when playing online games? Do you get hit by enemy bullets even when you successfully hide behind cover?
This happens when the ping is too high, causing delays between the player’s movement and the server’s response, causing an annoying slowdown.
Here, we will explain why the ping is always high on your device and how you can get the lowest possible ping to make your gaming experience seamless.
Why is your ping too high?
There could be several reasons why your ping rate increases while you are gaming. Here are some possible causes of high ping:
- You are too far from your router.
- There is a problem with your Wi-Fi connection.
- Your ISP is throttling your internet speed.
- The router or modem you are using is outdated or has technical problems.
- Other processes are sucking up your network resources.
- There are too many devices on your network, causing it to slow down.
- You are playing a game with a VPN enabled.
- Slow response from the game server.
The question is: how can you find out what is causing the ping to increase and how can you reduce it?
Considering that it could be any of the factors we listed above, you’ll need to monitor your network until you find the culprit and make some changes to your settings. So, keep reading.
6 tips to get the lowest possible ping
Getting the best possible ping on your device will require you to optimize your internet connection in addition to finding the root cause of the high ping. But don’t worry, as we will teach you how to reduce it.
1. Check your internet connection
Poor internet connection is the main cause of high ping. If your internet speed is too low, your online games will lag. Poor internet connection could be caused by a terrible connection from your ISP or inefficient hardware like a modem or router. So test your connection on any free internet speed test website and see how fast it is.
If the speed is much lower than what your ISP advertises for your plan, check to see if someone in your neighborhood uses the same ISP. If other users are also experiencing slower internet speeds, it might be time to change your internet service provider. However, if you are the only one experiencing slow internet speed, do the following:
- Make sure your hardware, like your router or modem, is working properly.
- Make sure all physical connections are wired correctly and the router has no hardware issues.
- Remove any physical objects between your device and the router.
- Move closer to the router.
- Make sure the problem is not related to your device settings causing the ping rate to increase. Please fix the underlying issue to significantly reduce the ping rate.
- Use a wired connection, such as an Ethernet cable, to access the Internet, as it is more stable than a wireless connection.
- Reboot your router to clear the cache, which may help bring your internet speed back to normal.
If none of the above steps improves your ping rate, subscribe to a package that offers faster speeds. If the internet speed is already good, continue to the next step.
2. Free up network resources
The speed and stability of your Internet connection won’t matter if your resources are constantly being depleted. If you are running other network-intensive processes such as live game streaming, large file download, etc., your ping will increase because fewer resources will be available for game processing.
Similarly, if there are too many devices connected to the same Internet connection, hogging your resources, you may encounter the same problem. Therefore, you should close any resource-intensive processes currently running on your device. You should also disconnect other devices connected to the same Internet connection.
However, if no other devices on your network are using your Internet bandwidth, the problem could be with the game server.
3. Change your server
A high ping rate is usually the result of a miscommunication between the packet transmission rate of your connection and the response from the game server. When you are sure that your internet speed is good enough, the culprit might be the game server you are connected to.
Many games and even some social platforms, such as Discord, allow users to connect to a different server if they experience delays in connecting to a server. So please switch to your nearest server to see if it fixes the problem.
4. Enable or disable your VPN
Most Internet service providers throttle the user’s Internet connection to limit bandwidth consumption for specific processes. This is known as ISP throttling.
With a VPN, you can successfully hide all your activities from your ISP. If your ISP doesn’t know you’re running processes that consume a lot of network resources, they won’t throttle your connection.
So you need to enable a VPN and run the game again. If the ping rate drops, keep the VPN enabled. If not, revert the change.
Do you already have a VPN enabled while playing the game? If so, you should turn it off. When you use a VPN, your traffic is routed through a remote server, which lengthens the communication process between the servers. This results in a decrease in speed and a delay in response.
Keeping this in mind, you should disable VPN on your device if it is already enabled. If the ping gets worse, you can turn it back on.
5. Play outside of regular hours
There are some games whose servers fill up during specific hours of the day, but this is not the case with most online games. So scheduling your gaming hours for a different time during the day can help you achieve lower ping.
The best way to determine the best time to play is by trial and error. So you have to play the game at different times during the day to determine when the ping is lowest.
6. Change game settings
If none of the solutions listed above effectively reduce ping, your last resort should be to tweak your game settings so that the resources are used for the required processes instead of being wasted.
For example, lowering your graphics settings may negatively affect your visuals, but it will significantly reduce perceived lag. Similarly, if your game allows you to control audio quality, screen refresh rate, and similar settings, be sure to adjust them so your game runs smoothly.
Get the best online gaming experience
Network lag and high ping can make gaming a real chore. Hopefully, our article has given you a better understanding of the reasons behind high ping.
Also, the tips we listed in the article will help you reduce the ping significantly. If your Internet connection is slow and you cannot change your ISP, you should optimize your Wi-Fi settings to ensure smooth gameplay.