Who needs a gigabit?
If you’re considering signing up for a gigabit internet connection, it’s worth asking yourself what precisely you expect to do with it. In future, it’s predicted that such services will power immersive real-time AR and VR experiences, but today there aren’t many applications tha t benefit from these sorts of enormous speeds. For your usage there may be no downside to sticking with a cheaper mid-range broadband package, at least for the foreseeable future.
What won’t benefit
Web browsing, shopping and social media A fast connection can help web pages and search results appear more quickly, but once you get past 100Mbits/sec, any additional speed won’t normally make any noticeable difference. If your content doesn’t appear right away, that’s likely down to how long it takes the server to generate your content and your device to render it, rather than transfer speed.
Video streaming For 4K HDR video streaming, Disney+ recommends an internet speed of 25Mbits/sec. As long as you’re above that baseline, a faster line won’t make any difference to your viewing experience, even if you have several family members all wanting to watch at once in different rooms.
What might benefit
Downloading apps and games With a gigabit connection you can theoretically download files at speeds of over 100MB/second, but not all third-party servers will send you items at that speed. On Windows and the Xbox we’re accustomed to seeing downloads top out at around 60MB/sec over a gigabit line, which is no faster than you’d get from a broadband connection running at half the speed.
Cloud syncing and backup If you work with remote files then a faster internet connection can help big documents zip promptly down the line. Again, though, everything depends on the server at the other end: I tried accessing a 10GB file on Google Drive and had to wait over three minutes for it to download over my gigabit line – an effective download speed of around 440Mbits/sec. Some ISPs’ services are asymmetrical, so your own changes and backups will be slower to upload.
Online gaming A faster connection can help load levels more quickly, and even get you into the game ahead of your opponents. But if that’s your priority then gigabit internet is overkill: even if you’re streaming the whole game, it shouldn’t need any more bandwidth than a 4K video. In fact, for gaming, latency (response speed) is more important than overall bandwidth; check the ISPs available in your area to find which can give you the slickest gaming experience.
What will benefit
Remote work When you’re accessing company servers, a gigabit line should help everything feel snappy and responsive, especially if you’re accessing a remote desktop. Again, though, latency comes into play, and you’ll get a good experience only if the company has made the necessary investment in its own infrastructure.
File sharing We’re not suggesting that file sharing is the best use of a gigabit internet line, but if that’s what you’re into it’s a highly attractive prospect. BitTorrent clients can concurrently download different segments of a file from different locations, so you can connect to ten or 20 seeders at once and completely saturate your internet pipe with incoming data.