How to Increase Internet Speed

Whether at home or at work, a fast and efficient internet connection still plays an important part in everyday life. Slow and weak network makes you frustrated, lose money without being satisfied. As more and more Internet devices are available at home and work, increasing internet speed is more important than ever. See step 1 for how to increase internet speed and maximize your device’s network connection performance.

Table of Contents

Hardware and service testing

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Try speed test. There are many free online tools that allow you to test your internet speed. Search for the keyword “speed test” on your favorite search engine and test a few services. You may need to install a plugin to run the speed test.

Different testing services will give different results, even if you test the same service twice. This is understandable since the test servers are located in many different regions and the number of people online can affect the network speed. It’s best to test multiple times and then average.

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Compare network speed results with what you pay. Check the speed of the package you subscribe to. Many service providers announce speeds “up to” a certain number, meaning they cannot guarantee that speeds will always be this high.

If the network is constantly lagging behind the speed of your plan, contact customer service and request a reduction or increase in network speed to match the amount you pay.
If you haven’t upgraded your internet in a while, you can find a higher speed plan at a reasonable price. Contact your local supplier for details.
Don’t fall into the megabit/megabyte trap. Your network service provider ads are all megabits, not megabytes. There are 8 megabits (Mb) in 1 megabyte (MB), if your plan is 25 megabits per second (Mbps), it’s actually only about 3 megabytes per second (MBps).

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Turn off the modem and restart it. Sometimes just a reset can significantly improve internet speed. You can turn the router on and off to see if that helps. Just make sure you remember your login information in case the computer asks for it after the reset.

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Change Wi-Fi channel. If many people in the building use the same Wi-Fi channel, you will notice a significant decrease in network speed. Use a program like inSSIDer for PC and KisMAC or WiFi Scanner for Mac to scan channels that don’t have many users. Change to one of those channels to reduce interference and improve network speed.

If you see an open channel, change to it to increase internet speed. You should consult your router’s documentation or look it up on the support page for how to access the router and change the wireless channel.

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Change the location of the wireless router and the computer. If you connect to the network via a Wi-Fi router, a poor signal can slow down your network speed or drop the network. Sit as close to the router as possible to boost the signal, or place the computer near the router. ^{[1] X Research Source}

If the router is old, you can replace it with a new one. Newer devices improve a lot in terms of connectivity and speed compared to older devices. ^{[2] X Research Source}
The cable connecting the DSL modem to the wireless router is dirty, dusty, or loose, which also significantly reduces the network speed. You can buy an air compressor at an electronics store to blow away dust from the connector.
Keep electrical equipment in a well-ventilated place to avoid overheating.

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Try using Ethernet instead of Wi-Fi. If possible, hardwire as many connected devices as possible. This will improve internet speed for hard-attached devices, while reducing conflicts with wireless devices, such as tablets and phones.

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Network Security. If you don’t set a password for your wireless network, you not only leave yourself vulnerable to being tracked, but you also create an opportunity for others to use it freely, which means they can steal your bandwidth. It’s best to protect your wireless network properly, especially in crowded apartments.

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Check the filter if DSL is available. When DSL is enabled, you connect the wire from the phone jack to one side of the rectangular filter box. The other side will have 2 here, 1 wire to the phone and 1 wire to the modem. If using a DSL connection over a landline, make sure you have a high-quality filter to optimize signal speed.

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Avoid running multiple devices at the same time. Turn off smartphones, tablets, smart TVs, and other devices when not in use. If many devices are getting information from the internet, especially watching videos or playing games, the network speed will be very slow.

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Check data limit. Many service providers set data limits that are not immediately available. Log in to your account page or contact customer service to check if you’ve exceeded your limit. Normally, when you exceed the allowable limit, the network speed will decrease until the end of the month.

Clean up browser and operating system

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Scan for viruses and malware. Viruses, adware, and other malicious software can significantly reduce your internet speed and computer speed. You need to regularly scan your system to make sure it is not infected with viruses or malware.

If you don’t have anti-virus software installed, install one immediately and remember to update it regularly.
Antivirus programs don’t always detect all problems, so you scan with programs like Spybot or Malwarebytes to find and remove stubborn malware.

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Clear browser cache. When you surf the web, the browser saves the information of that page to load the page faster the next time you visit. Over time, the more information is stored, the slower the browser will be. Clearing the cache can improve the performance of your browser when it is running slow.

Follow this guide to clear the cache of any browser or device.

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Uninstall the tool on the browser. After years of using the browser, you installed too many tools, now it’s time to get rid of some (or all) of them. Tools degrade browser performance and consume bandwidth by often requesting advertisements and information.

Refer to more articles online to know how to remove the tool from any web browser.

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Browser update. Browsers are developed continuously, newer versions often provide better performance than older versions. Check if the version you are using is the latest version, if not, proceed with the update.

Update Internet Explorer
Update Google Chrome
Update Firefox

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Change web browser. If you have too many tools and plugins installed in your browser, it is best to switch to a new browser instead of trying to remove the entire tool. Some browsers are quite fast, you will notice a significant increase in performance. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

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Clean up the hard drive. A slow computer will negatively affect the web surfing experience, making you think that the network is slow. Please refer to more articles online to clean up old data in the hard drive.

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Turn off frequently. To avoid being hacked or sluggish, you should turn off your computer every day. Enable automatic security updates for all programs. ^{[4] X Research Sources}

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Uninstall bandwidth-hungry programs. Maybe your computer has installed bandwidth-hungry programs that you don’t even know about. Go to the list of installed programs and remove any programs you don’t use or you don’t remember installing. Be careful when deleting programs you don’t know well, look online first to see if it’s an important program.

Uninstall programs on Windows.
Uninstall programs on Mac OS X.

Change bandwidth speed (Windows 7)

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Open Run by pressing the key (Windows logo + R). Then type gpedit.msc in the Run window. You will see a new window appear.

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Select Administrative Templates. Then select “Network” under “Administrative Templates”.

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Select and double click on “QoS Packet Scheduler”. You can find this on the right side of the screen.

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Select and double click on “Limit Reservable Bandwidth”. If default settings are used, this is set to “Not Configured”. However, even though the write bandwidth limit is 0%, Windows 7 still reserves 20% of the current available bandwidth.

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Click on “Enable”. Drag the bandwidth percentage to 0% and select “Apply”. Click “Okay” when prompted.

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Run Disk Cleanup and restart the browser. The computer will now use 100% of the total available bandwidth. You should see slightly faster download speeds.

Warning

The gpedit.msc file that is part of the QoS packet Scheduler is only available on Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Enterprise, and Windows 7 Ultimate, as well as newer versions of Windows.

Advice

Try closing all tabs on your browser before you start browsing.
You can use the TCP Optimizer program to throttle your internet connection.

Steps

Hardware and service testing

Clean up browser and operating system

Change bandwidth speed (Windows 7)

Warning

Advice

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