[SOLVED] VPN - Can it slow down the Wi-fi speed of others connected to the same network with it on/is it possible to not get any slowed network speed?

[ShangWang]

Does using VPN use up more Wi-fi/data than normal if you didn't have it on, and if it does would that mean having VPN on can also slow down the Wi-fi speed for others who are connected to the same network? How?

Is it also possible to have a VPN that does not slow down your internet speed at all? Is it even possible to get faster speed than if you were using your Wi-fi as normal without it?

 

[bill001g]

It depends on how technical you want to be.

In general vpn has very little effect on the traffic running through it.

Now it will always be slower....looking at it from the viewpoint of how long it takes to transfer xxxmbytes of data. The maximum packet size is still about 1500 bytes but you are now adding extra headers to the data packet. This means you can place less actual data into the packets so there is more overhead.

Next since it is using more total bandwidth it will slow your internet down more than it not having vpn. But your internet does not run slower unless you are hitting 100% utilization. What this mostly means is the latency/ping time will not be affected unless you max the circuit but you will eat your data cap if it exists faster.

The other things that increase vpn ping/laterncy though are more basic. There is cpu overhead to encrypt the data. If you are using a computer to do this you likely can't measure the tiny extra delays but if you use vpn on a cell phone it is more obvious. Next in most cases the data must take a longer path to go all the way to the vpn company data center and then to the remote server. In some very small cases a vpn can be faster if the vpn company has better connectivty to the ISP the remote server is using. A very common one used for some games is called exitlag. This company has purchased optimum fiber paths to some the game companies data center. It tends to not make much difference in areas like the USA or EU but it is used a lot say in asia where all ISP do not have good connections to all the different undersea fibers.

You will notice I did not mention wifi. The wifi can make things worse because there is more total data being transmitted which takes more chance to be damaged by interference. Still this is more a wifi problem than a vpn issue.