It does not save the results anywhere, so if you want to remember them you would have to write them in Notes or take a screenshot.
The graphic lights up and the speed test begins.Ī summary of the results are displayed afterwards and it shows the ping and upload and download speeds. There are a few buttons but the only one worth mentioning is Start. Speed Test runs as a menu bar icon and when clicked it displays a panel with a speedometer style graphic in the middle. The addition of the menu bar icon makes this an app even more useful. You can easily see when the Mac is transferring data.Ĭlick the menu bar icon and a panel is displayed that shows the Wi-Fi name, MAC address, security, protocol, channel and band. Live upload and download speeds are shown and it is useful as an indicator of internet activity. WiFi is more than just an internet speed test and it adds an icon to the menu bar. It keeps a history of speed test results so you can see if there is any change throughout the day or over the days or weeks.ĭr. The results are displayed as it tests and also afterwards. Click it and the graphic starts spinning as it measures the internet upload and download speed, and ping (speed of response). WiFi displays a large window with a circular graphic in the centre and there is just one button, Start Test with no other controls.
Price: Free | By: Trend Micro | Size: 4 MB | macOS: 10.12 or laterĭr. The ping is the time taken to respond and a quick response means a faster internet, so look for low figures.Īll the apps here are free in the Mac App Store. Download speeds maqy be a quarter of the upload speed or even less. People spend more time downloading than uploading, so it is given priority. The download speed is always much greater than the upload speed and this is by design. The speed measured reflects what speed you are currently getting, but it could be very different an hour later when more people arrive or people leave at the public Wi-Fi hotspot. Someone could be downloading a large file, someone could be watching YouTube, another person could be viewing a web page with video ads and so on. Test public Wi-Fi hotspotsĪ major problem with testing the speed at cafes, hotels, airports and other public Wi-Fi hotspots is that you are almost never alone. At peak times of the day the internet may slow down, so try running speed test apps at different times and take an average. General congestion on the internet, such as at peak times of the day, can affect the results too. One test is interesting but it could be unreliable because of other devices using the internet.
If you are testing the speed of the internet and someone in another part of the building is watching a movie in high resolution on Netflix for example, it is going to affect the speed results, and possible cause their movie to stutter.
Avoid testing just before and just after a macOS update.Close menu bar apps if they use the internet.
Make sure backup software like Time Machine is not backing up.The Mac must be prepared before testing the speed of the internet connection: Talk to other people and see what speeds they get and compare them with your own. A fibre optic internet connection in a city can be very different to a connection in a rural area. What is normal for one person is not necessarily normal for another and connection speeds vary with location and the type of connection.
Sometimes several people or devices are using the internet at the same time and it needs the bandwidth to cope with them all.
The problem is that we stream movies in HD or even 4k resolution, stream high quality music, upload and download images to online photo libraries, and even work online (this article is being written in the Microsoft Word web app at using a browser). I thought it was blindingly fast at the time, but now many people consider anything less than double digits to be slow.
The speed is measured in megabits per second (Mbps) and single digit speeds are considered to be quite slow these days.Īt one time a 5 Mbps internet connection was the fastest around and the very first broadband internet connection I had was just 0.5 Mbps. One way to see if there is a problem is to measure the performance of the internet connection. You could blame your Mac, the internet connection, your ISP, or the cafe or hotel where you are using a MacBook. When there is a problem with the internet it can be difficult understanding what the cause might be. Is the internet slow today or is there something wrong with your Apple Mac? Is the public Wi-Fi you are using fast or slow? Get the answers to these questions by with internet speed tests.