Google’s Video Quality Report About YouTube
Valerio Spagnuolo
Jul 6, 2014
If you’ve always wondered how it is that video streaming works, then here are some interesting insights from Google about the video quality differences on YouTube.
Read Also: Viral Video: Around the World in 360° Selfies
The video you are trying to watch on YouTube is taken from one of the many copies of YouTube videos that are available around the world, and of course, the service chooses the one that is closest to you.
Transfer Of Data To Your ISP
The moment you click play, the YouTube streaming service transfers the video as data pockets to your Internet Service Provider (ISP) through its system using the path that is the most feasible. During times of excess traffic or congestion, the service may use a path that is more or less indirect.
Bringing Your Video Home
It is only when the video is received from YouTube by your ISP that the herculean task of bringing it to your home across the network is taken up. This can only be done if your ISP has efficient capacity to accommodate the data that YouTube is sending, in the absence of which you will have to deal with low quality video streaming.
Congestion Of Your ISP
Apart from congestion of an ISP network, there are a few other factors that influence the performance of your YouTube video. These include the size of your ISP home connection, the setup of your wi-fi, as well as the number of devices connected to your network.
Taking Forever To Load
And when we say bad video quality, you know what all that entails – from fuzzy picture quality to constant interruptions, you’ve been there done that. Overall, the point of this is that poor video performance is rarely ever Google’s fault.
The silent culprit to blame is, in fact, your Internet Service Provider. But fret not, for now you can gauge whether your ISP can sustain HD videos for YouTube or not, thanks to Google’s initiative.
