Vodafone Latency problems

[roughbeast]

Vodafone advertise their service as having very low latency and therefore being very good for gamers. Sometimes they fulfill their implicit promise, but often they don't. Widely, in VF forums there are complaints about high latency of >20ms. Now I have been hit with the same problem. I noticed it after my sons complained of slow action on their shoot 'em up games. Ping and speed tests showed latency up to 32ms.

Vodafone maintain a number of BNGs (Broadband Network Gateways) across their national network to interface with networks such as CityFibre. Ideally, users should be routed through the nearest BNG to their geographical location, but Vodafone, for load balancing reasons, sometimes shove users through BNGs at the opposite end of the country. This is what has happened to me. I used to be routed through the Birmingham BNG, the nearest to me. My latency averaged at 7ms. Having spotted high latency I did a trace route, which clearly showed that my BNG was now Leeds! ( I have a list of BNG IPs.)

So, be warned. If you leave VM or other ISP for Vodafone's supposed low latency, don't bother. I will be leaving Vodafone at the end of my contract. There are a number of ISPs out there that use CityFibre's local and national network, which has been built from scratch for purpose and future proofed.