Video calls have become a daily tool for work, school, and staying connected. While download and upload speeds matter, latency and jitter often have a bigger impact on call quality.
What Is Latency?
Latency is the delay between sending and receiving data. High latency causes noticeable delays in conversations.
What Is Jitter?
Jitter is the variation in latency. Even if your average latency is low, high jitter can cause freezing, audio dropouts, and choppy video.
Typical Latency in Canada
- Fibre: 5–20 ms
- Cable: 20–40 ms
- DSL: 30–60 ms
- Fixed wireless: 40–100 ms
- Satellite: 500+ ms
How to Improve Video Call Quality
- Use a wired connection
- Move closer to your router
- Close background apps
- Ask others in the home to pause heavy downloads
- Upgrade to fibre if available