I have a 25Mbps Comcast (cable) connection that gives me 30Mbps throughput, measured with active torrents (not while playing YouTube videos obviously). When viewing YouTube videos, they pause → buffer → play → pause → buffer etc etc. This happens on our wired PC, wired iMac, wireless MacBook, iPad and iPhone. Whether I have 1 video playing or 20, they all play the same speed/rate it seems. Never has a single YouTube video even put a dent in my bandwidth utilization (measured at the router) so I know it’s more than likely not my connection.
Probably unrelated, but I get 20-25ms latency to www.youtube.com with 0 packet loss. Here is my Speedtest.net test:
Is there a way to force YouTube to utilize more of my unused bandwidth to reduce the pauses and provide a better viewing experience?
Best Answer
One way or another the bandwidth will be throttled by either your Internet Service Provider and/or the site itself.
Imagine everyone with your current speed (or higher) all trying to load videos at once!