What Is a Good Ping for Gaming?
A good ping for gaming is under 50 ms, and under 20 ms is excellent for competitive play. Ping is the round-trip delay between your device and the game server, measured in milliseconds (ms) — the lower it is, the more instantly the game responds when you move, aim or click. This guide explains exactly what counts as a good ping, the recommended ping for 22 popular titles and platforms — Fortnite, Valorant, CS2, Warzone, League of Legends and more, each with its own detailed guide — why ping matters more than raw Mbps, and the difference between ping and FPS. You can measure your own ping in seconds with the free SpeedSnap speed test.
Good ping for gaming: the quick answer
When you run a speed test, your ping result tells you how responsive your connection is for real-time games. Here is how to read the number against a nearby server:
| Ping (ms) | Rating | What it feels like in-game |
|---|---|---|
| Under 20 ms | Excellent | Effectively instant. Competitive-level responsiveness. |
| 20 - 50 ms | Good | Smooth for almost every online game. |
| 50 - 100 ms | Okay | Playable, but a slight disadvantage in fast shooters. |
| 100 - 150 ms | Laggy | Noticeable delay and rubber-banding in fast games. |
| Over 150 ms | Poor | Sluggish and frustrating for anything real-time. |
So the best ping for gaming is the lowest you can get. Most players are perfectly happy anywhere under 50 ms, while competitive shooters and fighting games reward pushing it under 30 ms. For a full definition of the metric itself, see our guide on what ping is.
Recommended ping by game
Different genres have different tolerances. A sandbox builder barely notices 80 ms, while a tactical shooter punishes every extra millisecond. The tables below group 22 popular titles by genre and give the target ping for each. Every game name links to its own full guide, and the targets here are taken straight from those pages — so the number you read here is the number you will read there.
Tactical shooters
Round-based games decided by a single peek. These have the tightest ping requirements on the whole list.
| Game | Target ping | Why it matters for that title |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for CS2 | Under 30 ms ideal; under 50 ms fine | Valve's sub-tick system resolves shots on exact input timing, so latency decides who wins a corner. |
| Valorant ping targets | Under 35 ms ideal; under 50 ms fine | Riot's 128-tick servers only pay off if your inputs arrive quickly — ping sets peeker's advantage. |
| Good ping for Rainbow Six Siege | Under 30 ms ideal; under 50 ms very good | One-headshot gunplay through destructible walls, where a late packet loses the round outright. |
Battle royale
Big lobbies, long sightlines and fast rotations. Under 50 ms keeps you competitive; under 30 ms is the tournament target.
| Game | Target ping | Why it matters for that title |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for Fortnite | Under 50 ms; under 30 ms excellent | Builds and edits must appear instantly — latency costs you walls in box fights, not just aim. |
| Warzone ping targets | Under 50 ms; under 30 ms excellent | 100-plus player lobbies where gunfights resolve in a fraction of a second; the HUD can show your latency. |
| Good ping for Apex Legends | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Movement-heavy close-range trades, and an in-game datacenter screen that lets you pick the lowest-latency server. |
| PUBG ping guide | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms solid | Long-range gunplay with bullet travel and fast vehicles, where ping shows up as visible desync. |
Fast-paced and hero shooters
Low time-to-kill means the player whose hit registers first usually wins the fight.
| Game | Target ping | Why it matters for that title |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for Call of Duty | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Very low time-to-kill across Modern Warfare and Black Ops, so whoever registers a hit first takes the gunfight. |
| Call of Duty Mobile ping guide | Under 50 ms; under 30 ms excellent | Console-style gunfights played over Wi-Fi or 5G, where mobile networks stack jitter on top of ping. |
| Good ping for Overwatch 2 | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Precise aim tracking and ability timing; picking the closest Battle.net region sets your floor. |
| Destiny 2 ping targets | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Bungie's hybrid networking model makes a clean, stable connection matter more than in a typical shooter. |
MOBA
Not twitch shooters, but every last-hit and skillshot is click-precise, so latency is felt constantly.
| Game | Target ping | Why it matters for that title |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for League of Legends | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms great | Last-hits, skillshots and combos all shift with latency, and your Riot region sets the best ping available to you. |
| Dota 2 ping guide | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Last-hitting, landing stuns and cancelling animations are millisecond-accurate actions. |
Sports and physics games
These live or die on timing: your input has to line up with a simulation running on the server.
| Game | Target ping | Why it matters for that title |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for EA FC (FIFA) | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Passing, shooting and tackling are timing-based, so ping converts directly into input lag. |
| Rocket League ping targets | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Aerials and dribbles only work if the ball is really where your screen says it is. |
Open world, MMO and sandbox
More forgiving than a shooter, but high ping still means rubber-banding, delayed casts and late block placement.
| Game | Target ping | Why it matters for that title |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for GTA Online | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | Rockstar's peer-to-peer sessions mean the other players in your lobby affect you as much as your own line. |
| World of Warcraft latency guide | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | WoW reports home and world latency separately; casts, interrupts and PvP timing follow the world figure. |
| Good ping for Minecraft | Under 30 ms ideal; under 50 ms great | Multiplayer is fully server-based, so your ping is mostly a function of how far away the server you joined is. |
| Roblox ping guide | Under 50 ms; under 30 ms excellent | Thousands of separate experiences run on their own small servers, so ping can swing from one game to the next. |
Consoles and platforms
Not games, but the platform decides how you check your ping and what your realistic floor is.
| Platform | Target ping | Why it matters for that platform |
|---|---|---|
| Good ping for PS5 | Under 30 ms excellent; under 50 ms good | The PS5 never shows a true in-game ping, so you have to measure the connection itself to know your number. |
| Xbox ping and network test | Under 50 ms; under 30 ms excellent | The built-in network test, your NAT type and wired-versus-Wi-Fi together set your latency floor. |
| Good ping for Nintendo Switch | Under 50 ms; under 30 ms excellent | Most online Switch titles connect players directly to each other rather than to regional servers, which magnifies latency. |
These are guidance ranges, not hard limits. Plenty of casual players enjoy these games at 60 to 90 ms — you simply have a smaller margin for error against opponents on a lower ping. The key is a stable ping with low jitter, not just a low average.
Playing something not listed above? The genre is the best guide: treat anything round-based or aim-driven like the tactical shooters, and anything sandbox or turn-based like the open-world row. If you play across several of these, see how much internet speed gaming actually needs and what a wired connection changes for ping and jitter.
Does ping affect gaming?
Ping affects online gaming more than almost any other connection metric. When your ping is high, there is a delay between what you do and what the server registers. That shows up as:
- Lag — the world reacts a fraction of a second after your input.
- Rubber-banding — your character snaps back to a previous position.
- Delayed hit registration — you clearly hit a shot, but the server says you missed.
- Teleporting enemies — opponents appear to jump around the map.
Jitter — the variation in your ping from moment to moment — makes all of this worse. A connection that swings between 20 ms and 120 ms feels less reliable than a steady 60 ms. Aim for both low ping and low, stable jitter.
Ping vs FPS: they are not the same thing
This trips up a lot of gamers, so it is worth being clear. Ping is a network metric and FPS is a graphics metric — they measure entirely different parts of your setup:
- Ping (ms) depends on your internet connection. It is the round-trip time to the game server. Lower is better.
- FPS (frames per second) depends on your PC or console hardware — mainly your graphics card and CPU. It is how many images per second the game renders. Higher is better.
You can have buttery-smooth 240 FPS and still feel laggy if your ping is 150 ms, because your inputs reach the server late. Conversely, a 5 ms ping will not fix a slideshow caused by weak hardware. The best experience comes from low ping and high FPS together.
Why ping matters more than Mbps for gaming
It surprises many people that you do not need a fast plan to game well. Most multiplayer games send and receive only tiny amounts of data — often well under a few megabits — so even a modest 25 Mbps connection has bandwidth to spare. What you actually feel in-game is delay, and delay is ping.
This is why a player on a slower fiber plan with 10 ms ping usually has a smoother experience than someone on a faster cable plan with 80 ms ping and high jitter. When choosing a connection for gaming, prioritise low latency and a wired option over the biggest download number. Run a speed test and look at the ping result, not just the Mbps.
How to get a better ping for gaming
If your ping is higher than you would like, work through these in order. For a deeper walkthrough, see our full guide on how to lower ping.
- Use a wired Ethernet connection instead of Wi-Fi — usually the single biggest improvement to both ping and jitter.
- Choose the closest game server or region. Distance directly increases round-trip time.
- Close background downloads, updates and streaming on your network while you play.
- Restart your router and keep its firmware current.
- Enable QoS or gaming mode on your router to prioritise game traffic.
- Test before and after each change with a speed test so you can see what genuinely helped.
If your ping stays high on every server even after a wired connection and these tweaks, the bottleneck may be your line or your ISP's routing — that is worth raising with your provider.
Test your gaming ping now
The only way to know your real ping is to measure it. SpeedSnap reports your ping, jitter, download and upload in about 30 seconds — no app, no sign-up. Run a free speed test before your next session, learn more about the metric in what is ping, and follow how to lower ping if your numbers need work.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good ping for gaming?
For online gaming, under 50 ms is good and under 20 ms is excellent. Between 50 and 100 ms is still playable for most games, but you start to feel a slight delay in fast-paced shooters. Anything consistently above 100 ms causes noticeable lag, rubber-banding and delayed hit registration. Competitive players aim for the lowest ping possible, ideally under 30 ms.
Is 20 ms ping good for gaming?
Yes, 20 ms is an excellent ping for gaming. At 20 ms or lower your connection feels essentially instant, which is what competitive players in shooters and fighting games want. You typically see single-digit to low-20s ping on fiber or a wired Ethernet connection to a nearby server.
What ping is too high for gaming?
A ping consistently above 100 ms is too high for fast-paced online games and will cause visible lag and rubber-banding. Slower-paced games like turn-based strategy or many role-playing games can tolerate higher ping, but for shooters, fighting games and battle royales you want to stay under 50 ms wherever possible.
Does ping affect gaming more than internet speed?
Yes. For online gaming, ping matters far more than your download speed in Mbps. Most games send tiny amounts of data, so even a 25 Mbps connection is plenty. What you feel in-game is the delay, which is ping. A low ping on a modest plan beats a high ping on a fast plan for responsiveness.
What is the difference between ping and FPS?
Ping and FPS measure completely different things. Ping is a network metric, the round-trip delay between your device and the game server in milliseconds, and it depends on your internet connection. FPS (frames per second) is a graphics metric that depends on your PC or console hardware and shows how smoothly the game renders. Low ping plus high FPS gives the best experience.
How do I lower my ping for gaming?
Use a wired Ethernet connection instead of Wi-Fi, pick a game server closest to your location, close background downloads and streaming apps, restart your router, and enable QoS or gaming mode if your router supports it. Test your ping before and after each change so you can see what actually helped.
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