Good Ping for Gaming

What is a good gaming ping?

As a rough guide, under 20 ms feels excellent, 20–50 ms is good, 50–80 ms is usually playable, and over 100 ms can feel delayed in fast games. Stability matters too: a steady 40 ms can feel better than a connection jumping between 20 ms and 150 ms.

Ping is not the same as speed

Download speed controls how quickly games, updates and files download. Ping controls reaction delay during online play. A faster package does not automatically mean lower ping if the problem is Wi‑Fi, routing, congestion, packet loss or a distant game server.

How to lower ping for gaming

• Use Ethernet instead of Wi‑Fi where possible.
• Pause game downloads, updates, cloud backups and 4K streaming while playing.
• Choose the nearest game server or region.
• Restart the router if latency stays unusually high.
• Test at different times of day to spot peak-time congestion.
• Keep consoles and PCs updated, but avoid updates during play.

Check jitter and packet loss too

Low ping is only part of the picture. Jitter causes inconsistent delay, while packet loss causes missing data. Both can lead to rubber-banding, stutter, delayed shots and voice chat problems.

Quick diagnosis checklist

• Run a LinkSpeed test and note download speed, upload speed, ping and jitter.
• Repeat the test on Ethernet where possible to remove Wi‑Fi from the results.
• Pause downloads, cloud backups, game updates and streaming on other devices.
• Test again at a different time of day to check whether congestion is involved.
• Keep screenshots or notes if you need to report the issue to your provider.

FAQs

Related LinkSpeed pages