Packet loss test
Find out how many packets your connection drops, plus jitter and ping, measured over a real voice connection. It takes about 30 seconds.
Test Your Connection
Tests your connection on the same path your calls actually travel—latency, jitter, packet loss, and speed.
What your packet loss result means
| Packet loss | Rating | What you'll notice |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 0.5% | Excellent | Calls sound clean. |
| 0.5 to 1% | Good | The odd syllable may drop. Most people won't notice. |
| 1 to 2.5% | Fair | Words clip and voices go robotic now and then. |
| Over 2.5% | Poor | Choppy calls and frozen video. From 3% the test rates the whole connection poor. |
Where packet loss usually comes from
Wi-Fi
The most common cause. Walls, distance and neighbours on the same channel all drop packets. Run the test once on Wi-Fi and once on a cable: if the cable is clean, you've found it.
A busy connection
Cloud backups, game downloads and 4K streams on the same line crowd out call traffic.
VPNs and old routers
A VPN adds another hop that can drop packets. Routers that haven't been restarted in months often improve after a reboot.
Want download and upload speeds too? Run the full VoIP speed test. Connection fine but people can't hear you? Test your microphone.
Packet loss questions
What is packet loss?
Voice and video travel in small packets. Packet loss is the share that never arrives. A few lost packets make a call skip or sound robotic, because the app has nothing to play for those milliseconds.
What's a good packet loss result?
Under 0.5% is excellent and under 1% is fine for calls. Between 1% and 2.5% you'll hear glitches, and above that most voice and video calls struggle.
What's the difference between packet loss, jitter and ping?
Ping is how long a packet takes to get there and back. Jitter is how much that time varies; high jitter makes voices stutter even when nothing is lost. Packet loss is how many never arrive. Calls need all three to be low.
How do I fix packet loss?
Plug in an ethernet cable if you can, since most loss starts on Wi-Fi. Otherwise move closer to the router, pause big downloads and backups, turn off a VPN, and restart the router. If loss stays high on a cable, contact your internet provider.
Is this test different from a normal speed test?
Yes. Speed tests measure download and upload over TCP, which retries lost data, so loss stays hidden. This one sends real-time voice traffic over WebRTC, the way a browser call does, so the loss shows.