A guide to broadband speeds for gaming

Battling it out in a fast-paced shooter. Competing for your next sports title. Exploring an open world with friends. Whatever you’re doing, your broadband connection plays a huge part in how your gaming experience feels.

The last thing you want mid-game is to be distracted by buffering or a sudden disconnection.

But what’s the best speed for gaming? And has cloud gaming changed the rules?

Here’s everything you need to know.

Surprisingly, online gaming doesn’t need as much bandwidth as you might think. Most online games only use a small amount of data during gameplay, often needing download speeds of around 3-10Mbps and upload speeds of 1-3Mbps. 

Having a stable connection with low latency – also known as ping – is often more important. 

A general guide to gaming speeds:

• Casual online gaming: 10-25Mbps
• Competitive multiplayer gaming: 25-50Mbps
• Gaming while others are streaming or working from home: 50-100Mbps or more
• Large households with multiple gamers and connected devices: 100Mbps or more

While these speeds will comfortably support gaming, faster broadband can make a big difference when it comes to downloading new games, installing updates or patches, and sharing your connection with the rest of the household.

A stable low-latency connection’s often more important than simply having the fastest download speed. For example, a slightly slower connection with consistently lower latency can give you a smoother gaming experience than a very fast connection with high latency spikes.

Latency or ping, measures how long it takes for data to travel from your device to a game server and back again.

Low latency: this is what you want for gaming. Your actions are registered quickly making gameplay feel more responsive.

High latency: this is where you’ll see a delay between your controller and what’s happening on screen. It can also cause freezing, players jumping around the map unexpectedly, and disconnections.

Traditionally, most gamers would download games directly to their console, PC or mobile devices and use their internet connection to play with others online. But cloud gaming services are becoming more popular. They let players stream games instantly – the same way we stream TV shows and films.

Both need a good broadband connection to work at their best, but they put very different demands on your network.

Traditional online gaming uses very little bandwidth – your broadband’s mainly used to send info like player movements or match data, between you and the game’s servers.

Cloud gaming, on the other hand, is basically streaming a live, interactive video feed – so needs a faster, more consistent connection.  

If you’re on Three 5G broadband, you’ll have unlimited data, but it’s handy to know just how much data online gaming uses.

Playing a game online actually uses less data than you might expect. Microsoft estimates that online gaming for an hour a day typically can use around 3-12GB per month. But if you’re playing for several hours a day, that can increase to 10-50GB. Exactly how much you use depends on the game and how you play.

Cloud gaming’s a different story. Because you’re streaming the game, rather than running it on your device, it uses more data than traditional online gaming. The amount you use will vary depending on the service, streaming quality, and how long you play.  

This is where data usage ramps up. Modern games are much larger than they were a few years ago with some requiring downloads of 100GB or more. That increases further with additions like expansion packs.

Even if you’ve already downloaded a game, updates like bug fixes, seasonal content, or expansions can add to a game’s download size.

Gaming is hugely social and services like Discord, Xbox Party Chat, PlayStation voice chat, and other in-game communications add extra data traffic. That’s because your device is continuously sending and receiving audio. Voice chat data usage is pretty small compared to game downloads but still adds to your overall usage – especially during gaming marathons.

Upload speeds become more important if you decide to stream your gaming sessions on Twitch, YouTube, or TikTok Live. That’s because you’re continuously uploading video of your gameplay while also using your connection to play the game.  

Download speed matters – you don’t want to be stuck waiting for a massive game update to install before you can play.

Faster broadband helps reduce waiting times for:

• New game downloads
• Patches
• Seasonal updates
• Expansion packs
• System software updates

With some current games going over 100GB, fast broadband can cut the amount of time you spend waiting for downloads and updates.

Our 5G Home Broadband is the perfect gaming partner, thanks to super-fast speeds and that all-important low latency. 

With average download speeds of around 150Mbps¹ and estimated maximum speeds of over 500Mbps, our 5G broadband deals with your gaming needs effortlessly. And with unlimited data, you don’t need to keep count of every game, patch or update you download.

Plus, you can connect up to 30 different devices, keeping everyone in the house happy.  

To find out more about how 5G is impacting gaming, take a look at our recent piece on the 5G gaming revolution.

For most gamers, a stable connection with low latency matters more than getting the fastest speed. But, as game downloads get larger, cloud gaming become more popular, and we connect more devices than ever before – faster broadband can deliver a noticeably better experience.

Discover Three 5G Broadband today