What is the right internet speed for my needs?
After having discussed the different types of internet connections you can get in your home, we want to follow-up with this next blog post about choosing the right internet speed for your needs.
There are 4 major factors to consider when it comes to choosing your speeds.
1. The number of internet users in your household
2. The number of devices that will be connected to the internet in your household
3. The activities you plan to do on the internet
4. Consider the price you are willing to pay for your connection/speed
1. The number of internet users in your household is very important. If for example, 4 people in your household are streaming or downloading at the same time, there will be lot of bandwidth usage at the same time. To make sure everyone has enough bandwidth for their needs you might need a faster speed plan.
if they are heavy users they probably need at least 100mbps download to divide it between the 4 users. But if you live by yourself and use the internet for streaming video content/music and browsing you will be fine with speeds up 15mbps.
2. Sometimes if you even live in small household you have to consider all the devices that you have connected or will connect to your internet network. If you like the internet of things and have almost every item constantly sending internet signals back and forth in your network such as monitoring devices, smart home appliances you probably need a connection that provides you with enough speed and bandwidth as well. In this case a mere 15 Mbps would not suffice.
3. If you are someone who needs to broadcast or upload very large amounts of data on the internet you probably want a plan that has high upload and download speeds. If you only do some light browsing and stream content in HD then you are fine with plans that speeds around 25Mbps in download.
4. One factor you have to consider is the price you are willing to pay for higher speeds of internet. Rule of thumb is that when speeds get faster, plans get more expensive. Furthermore, you need to check what internet connections and speeds are available at your home. If there is only one provider available you can bet the prices of internet plans will be very high because of the lack of competition.
Below I have compiled a very general breakdown of the speeds you might need for common activities on the internet
· To stream videos in SD on Netflix, at least 3 Mbps is recommended.
· To stream videos in HD on Netflix, at least 5 Mbps is recommended.
· To stream videos in HDR or 4K on Netflix, at least 25 Mbps is recommended.
· To stream videos in SD, at least 3 Mbps is recommended.
· To stream video on one internet device in HD, at least 7 Mbps is recommended.
· To stream video in HD on multiple internet devices, at least 13 Mbps is recommended.
· Emails and basic computer programs: 3-4 Mbps is recommended
· Skype group video calls: 10+ Mbps is recommended
· Large file transfers: 40+ Mbps is recommended
You need minimum speeds of 4-8 Mbps to game online, but for a consistently good gaming experience, 10-25 Mbps tend to be best. As you search for the best internet for gaming, keep in mind that download speed isn’t the only factor in a good gaming experience. Speed is important because it’s how quickly your game system transfers information from a gaming server. However, ping time and latency also matter.
I hope by giving you all the above information you can take the different factors into consideration when deciding on the internet speed you will need in your home. According to speedtest.net the average home internet speed in Canada is 76.23Mbps download and 25.07Mbps upload.
In our experience we find that speed in general good enough for household of 4 people where the parents stream some HD video content moderately, and the kids play online videogames from time to time.
With all that said, CanNet has a great promotion for 100Mbps high-speed unlimited internet for only $29.98/m for people in Ontario. Sign up now at: https://www.cannettel.com/internet/cable