While people worldwide are stuck at home due to the COVID-19 outbreak, Ookla Speedtest claims broadband speeds are catching up as much as the challenge.
Ookla, known for its Speedtest app, released numbers on the trends they observed during the outage. Here's a data on what the figures show.
The United States and net speeds as COVID-19 cases rise
The U.S. is among the worst-hit country in the list of those impacted by the pandemic, with cities like New York, San Francisco declaring lockdowns early on. Now, these have been extended to the entire country of California, New York, Connecticut, and Illinois.
Fixed broadband speeds in the U.S. flattened out after a moderate dip between Mar. 15 and 22, Ookla's results show, while speeds in Canada are continuing with a slow decline. According to the results, Both countries still have considerably better broadband than Mexico or those of Europe with average speeds between 110 and 140Mbps.
Mashable said mobile broadband speeds in the U.S. are barely down week over the week; however, it is not a pointy decline.
Internet speeds in Europe
After the U.S., Europe has tallied most of the infections. Speedtest said the average download speed over fixed broadband showed declines in Italy, France, Spain, and Switzerland between Mar. 23 to 29. Austria and Spain noticed a very mild increase in mobile download velocity all through the week of Mar. 23, even as France and Germany saw little exchange week over week.
Overall worldwide mobile volume
Speedtest noted a weekly speed degradation for its global data. The world average mobile download speed, for example, landed between 31.61 Mbps and 75.41 Mbps for fixed broadband in February 2020, according to the Speedtest Global IndexTM.
However, the Internet volume continued to grow internationally for both mobile and fixed broadband between Mar. 23 and 29 compared to the average 12 weeks prior. While these will increase were seen, fixed broadband saw the most significant change so far.
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Your Broadband May Still Have Problems
So if broadband speeds are not generally declining, why are you having trouble along with your video calls?
Mashable said you are using your home broadband more heavily than you have before. While the net backbones are doing fine, your home Wi-Fi network won't be, or you'll be hitting the bandwidth cap on your provider plan, or the server you're seeking to contact may be overwhelmed.
Several stories showed how conventional household electronics like microwave ovens can affect the 2.4GHz band on which many Wi-Fi networks rely.
Ofcom, the United Kingdom's media regulator, revealed there are common devices in our houses that can make your internet speed even slower than today.
Experts suggested pulling out kitchen appliances such as microwaves while making video calls, watching H.D. videos, or downloading files if you want to make things a little faster.
