At one point or another, you may have heard the word “bandwidth” thrown around. Maybe it was mentioned in an ad, sprinkled throughout your Internet provider contract, or just word that sounds familiar. Let’s take a closer look at ‘bandwidth’ and discover what it means for you.

Simply put, bandwidth is basically the medium that traverses data. It defines exactly how much data can be transmitted over a wireless network. It’s really important because it determines your Internet speed and can create a more responsive network.

What does that mean for you?

In today’s ever-changing world, speed is crucial and affects nearly everything. There’s instant food, worldwide news in notification blurbs, rapidly changing trends, overnight viral sensations, and so much more. As result, our society as a whole is seeing a rise in productivity, technological standards, and of course Internet speeds.

This is extremely important to the business world.  Fast Internet is being used for conference calls across the world, research, accessing databases, etc. With a faster and more reliable connection, businesses are better equipped to make innovations to successfully grow and develop.

On the other hand, some locations you visit have Internet that seems to just crawl along. Maybe you’ve even worked for a company that had low bandwidth. If that’s the case, most of your unproductive workday was probably spent with ever-buffering videos, consistent Internet restarts, and very little being accomplished within the digital world.

In your personal life, high bandwidth can keep your video streaming going uninterrupted. Baking is a breeze as you follow step-by-step instructions on your go-to recipe website, and your kids can finish their school research projects in a reasonable amount of time.

What Affects Bandwidth?

There are a few variables that can greatly affect your network’s speed. The first is one of the most important factors, your service provider subscription. This defines the absolute optimal speed that a user can achieve. If this is low, your wireless Internet speed will be slow.

Others using your Internet also affect it. The more devices connected, the slower your speed will be. This is even more prevalent if one or more devices are co-streaming.  Any multimedia streaming, such as videos, games, or music will use much more data than just website browsing. Thus, the type of Internet usage will greatly impact the available speed.

There are also many environmental variables, which can alter your optimal speed and degrade the quality of your signal. Any major obstructions like metal, thick walls, foliage, and mirrors will hinder a signal. Microwaves in close proximity to a Wi-Fi router can also be an issue as they emit the same radio frequency as a Wi-Fi signal.

Now that you know the basics of bandwidth, find a provider that can do the rest. Life is too short for slow Internet.

Have questions? Reach out to our friendly staff here.