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Home » Electronics & Gadgets » YouTube Buffering Giving You A Headache? 6 Tricks To Increase Your Internet Buffering Speed

YouTube Buffering Giving You A Headache? 6 Tricks To Increase Your Internet Buffering Speed

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YouTube videos and live streaming television can be great fun to watch, but having to pause and wait for the video your friend sent you to buffer can be very frustrating.

I can’t stand it when I have to wait to watch an online video. Honestly, I usually attempt to watch one, until I can’t stand how long it takes — I close out the video, and then I forget to look at it later.

Here’s one of the big secrets that a lot of people don’t even realize: internet buffering speeds can be increased! When you actively stream a video, it’s being downloaded and played at the same time.

youtube-buffering-main

The more detailed the video the more resources you will need. Internet buffering is your computer actually downloading the video faster than it plays.

By using these simple tricks, it’s guaranteed that YouTube buffering will be faster for you, and you may even be able to completely eliminate the need to ever have to wait for a video to buffer again!

 

#1 – Update your Adobe Flash Player

One of the reasons that your video may buffer slowly is because your version of Adobe Flash may be outdated. YouTube videos run on Flash, so it’s essential to make sure that your Adobe Flash Player is up to date with the latest version.

I’m guilty of always “clicking the X” to shut down alerts on my laptop. Since I have a new laptop and it started slowing a lot when downloading and streaming videos, I decided to pay more attention to pop-us and that has helped!

Check which version you have and to see if you need to update it. Notifications may pop up on our screen whenever a new update is available.

Here’s how to tell if Flash is installed  on your device.

 

#2 – Optimize your connection

The main reason that YouTube buffering can be so slow is the speed of your internet connection. Your current connection can be optimized to work more quickly using a free application called TCP Optimizer.

If you don’t understand what all of the options mean, simply select the bubble that says “optimize” then save the changes and restart your computer.

Your connection speed will now run a bit faster!

 

#3 – Lower the video quality/pausing

As a last resort, you should lower the quality of the videos you’re trying to stream or pause them before you begin to watch. This isn’t recommended, because you probably don’t like to sacrifice quality for time.

youtube-buffering-screen-shot

It typically depends on the type of video I’m trying to watch that will determine if I lower the quality of the video or not — but it does help!

To lower the quality of a YouTube video, select the box under the video that says 240p, 360p, or 480p, and change it to a lower number.

 

#4 – Avoid videos at popular times

The more videos being watched online at the same time will always affect your internet buffering speed.

The ideal time to watch YouTube videos if you have a slow buffering speed is when other people aren’t online.

Most of us spend 1/3 of our time online watching videos. You might want to consider watching very late in the evening or first thing in the morning to avoid heavy watch times.

 

#5 – Reduce the bandwidth usage

Your internet connection splits its speed between all applications using it.

Close any downloads, music streaming websites, online games, and anything else that streams video or music content, and your buffering speed will increase.

It may also help to close applications on your computer — such as media players, instant messenger applications, or any other processes — that may be slowing down your speed.

Here’s how to see which web services are running automatically.

 

#6 – Use a download accelerator

You can also use download accelerators to increase the buffering speed of your videos. One of the most popular and preferred download accelerators is SpeedBit Video Accelerator. Check it out!

This program is free and may dramatically reduce or even eliminate internet buffering times. I prefer to use this as a way to reduce the choppiness that HD videos seem to produce.

 

Increase the speed of videos you watch on Youtube or other video streaming websites. If you follow these tricks, your internet buffering speed will most definitely increase!

 

More About Increasing Internet Buffering Speed

  • Expert Reviews Of Download Accelerators
  • Should You Pay For Faster Internet Speed?
  • How To Test Your Internet Speed
  • How Much Bandwidth Is Necessary For Optimal Streaming?
  • What You Need To Know About Using Windows Task Manager
Aimee
Aimee

I’m a health nut, a frugal mom, a dog lover, a DIYer, and a gadget girl. Personally, as a post-divorce, working single mom on a budget I have a lot of experiences that I enjoy sharing so others can learn from the things I wish I knew earlier! Professionally, I’ve worked full-time in a variety of marketing, sales, and editing jobs. You can always find me at the corner of Good News & Fun Times as Managing Editor at The Fun Times Guide (32 fun & helpful websites).

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Filed Under: Electronics & Gadgets, Tech Tips & How To's Tagged With: apps, fun stuff, tech support and troubleshooting, videos, wifi and internet connections

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About Me

LynnetteI got my first computer in 1986 and immediately started writing, saving documents, and organizing my entire life on it. Thus began my love affair with gadgets and all things tech. I built my first website in 1998 in old-school HTML code -- before websites were "a thing". Blogs weren't invented yet. It was the same year that Google was born. My husband and I created TheFunTimesGuide.com in 2004 -- before YouTube, Twitter, Reddit, and Mashable were launched. That was the year Facebook started and 'blog' was the Word of the Year according Merriam-Webster. Ever since then, anytime a new electronic gadget hits the market... I have to have it. (My husband's impulsive nature to try out every new tech gadget invented is even worse than mine!) When I'm not trying out fun new tech gadgets, you'll find me at the corner of Good News & Fun Times as publisher of The Fun Times Guide (32 fun & helpful websites).

Lynnette: View My Blog Posts

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