Q&A: Why do my internet speeds differ from the speed test?
Question by Jef P: Why do my internet speeds differ from the speed test?
I just tried 2 internet speed tests, one from my internet provider, and a third party one. They both show around 1.5 mb/s for my download speeds, but when I really try to download something on my computer, it shows only 150 kb/s. Is here a way to get the speeds that the tests are showing?
All answers are appreciated
Best answer:
Answer by Eugene
Speed is determined by many factors, not only by your provider’s limit. A route from any particular server in the internet to your computer is like a system of unified hoses of different diameters. And only the smallest one really matters. It may be much smaller than your provider’s limit. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to adjust hoses diameter at will. 
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The most obvious reason is that the place you want to download from is limiting its delivery – one site I used to use would deliver at one rate for free and one file at a time but would let me download multiple files at much privileged rate if I paid. You may also need to check whether one measure is bits/second and the other is bytes/second. with overhead, one is about 10 times the other which is what you are reporting.
One reason could be that the units of measurement may not be the same. When you do an internet speed test, it will give you a reading in kilobits per second (kbps) or megabits per second (Mbps). When you look at your download speeds you may be looking at KiloBytes (KBPS) or MegaBytes per second (MBPS). A byte consists of 8 bits, so a kilobyte per second will be 8 times quicker than a kilobity per second.
Lastly, when you do a speed test using a speed test website – using DSL for example – you are measuring the speed from the local exchange to your modem – NOT to your computer. When you are responsibility a real download, you are measuring the speed that the modem can provide but limited by the speed that your computer can accept and store that data.