South African online gamers need a fast, stable, and reliant internet connection with low network latency.
This will allow you to play any game without lag or disconnections from the server.
It is therefore important that gamers do their due diligence before deciding on an Internet Service Provider (ISP) — otherwise, you will have to sit and wait for days before you’re able to play your next favourite game.
According to Steam’s download stats, while Vox Telecom is the most popular ISP in South Africa based on the number of bytes delivered to the network, Cool Ideas offers the fastest average download speed.
Steam download speeds
It is critical to ensure that your download speed is high when accessing Steam’s servers.
The table below shows Steam’s top 10 most popular South African ISPs — sorted by the average download speeds for users.
ISP speeds on Steam | |
---|---|
ISP | Download Speed |
Cool Ideas | 42.1Mbps |
Afrihost [Fibre] | 41.7Mbps |
Web Africa | 37.9Mbps |
Vox Telecom | 33.7Mbps |
Afrihost [Other] | 33.5Mbps |
Axxess OPTINET | 30.5Mbps |
Vodacom Business | 27Mbps |
HeroTel | 18.5Mbps |
Rain | 18.3Mbps |
Telkom Internet | 17Mbps |
It is important to note that while there may be faster ISPs in South Africa, they did not feature in the top 10 most popular ISPs according to Steam.
At the time of publication, the average download rate over the past seven days was 24.9Mbps, while South African users had downloaded a total of 1.3 Petabytes (PB) – which accounted for just 0.2% of Steam’s global traffic.
ISP speeds in South Africa
The MyBroadband Insights report recently revealed the best-performing South African ISPs with the highest speeds.
The results are based on the data collected via MyBroadband’s speed test platform between 1 January 2022 and 31 March 2022.
Cybersmart offered the highest average download and upload speeds over this period — 118.55 Mbps for downloads and 113.55 Mbps for uploads.
Below is a table showing the average speeds recorded on South Africa’s biggest ISPs.
Fastest ISPs – Q1 2022 | ||
---|---|---|
ISP | Average Download Speed (Mbps) | Average Upload Speed (Mbps) |
Cybersmart | 118.55 | 113.55 |
Cool Ideas | 71.11 | 55.91 |
Webafrica | 68.37 | 68.66 |
Metrofibre Networx | 65.54 | 47.45 |
Afrihost | 60.65 | 45.87 |
RSAWEB | 59.73 | 48.16 |
Axxess | 52.61 | 44.72 |
Home Connect | 48.26 | 45.45 |
MWEB | 43.13 | 35.48 |
Vox Telecom | 40.62 | 38.25 |
Supersonic | 34.52 | 36.79 |
Rain | 34.36 | 20.21 |
Airmobile | 33.56 | 28.75 |
MTN | 33.10 | 23.57 |
Internet Solutions | 30.49 | 33.70 |
HeroTel | 30.06 | 30.94 |
Vodacom | 28.65 | 20.59 |
Liquid Telecoms | 24.36 | 25.51 |
Cell C | 23.11 | 17.94 |
Telkom | 21.66 | 16.04 |
Jenny-internet | 8.93 | 15.80 |
Ikeja | 3.94 | 6.14 |
South African ISPs average network latency
When gaming is concerned, download speeds aren’t the only important factor to consider.
Latency, also known as ‘ping’, refers to the time between the user issuing a command on their device, and the command being executed online.
This means that gamers also require a low network latency for the best online multiplayer experience.
The MyBroadband Insights report also recorded the average latency for each ISP and found that Cool Ideas came out on top with just 18.85 milliseconds (ms).
It is also worth mentioning that these latency speeds are also dependent on your individual connection quality and personal hardware, and they therefore should not be seen as a complete reflection of network performance.
The table below shows the average latency of the major South African ISPs.
ISP average network latency | |
---|---|
ISP | Average Latency (ms) |
Cool Ideas | 18.85 |
Home Connect | 19.59 |
RSAWEB | 20.57 |
Cybersmart | 21.43 |
Webafrica | 21.85 |
Metrofibre Networx | 22.49 |
Vox Telecom | 30.71 |
MWEB | 31.5 |
Afrihost | 33.7 |
Axxess | 35.29 |
HeroTel | 41.26 |
Supersonic | 52 |
Internet Solutions | 53.34 |
Vodacom | 54.44 |
Liquid Telecoms | 55.12 |
Jenny-internet | 60.14 |
Telkom | 60.31 |
Airmobile | 66 |
MTN | 72.92 |
Cell C | 82.5 |
Rain | 84.81 |
Ikeja | 92.36 |
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