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Network delay is a design and performance characteristic of a telecommunications network. It specifies the latency for a bit of data to travel across the network from one communication endpoint to another. It is typically measured in multiples or fractions of a second. Delay may differ slightly, depending on the location of the specific pair of communicating endpoints. Engineers usually report both the maximum and average delay, and they divide the delay into several parts:
- Processing delay – time it takes a router to process the packet header
- Queuing delay – time the packet spends in routing queues
- Transmission delay – time it takes to push the packet's bits onto the link
- Propagation delay – time for a signal to propagate through the media
A certain minimum level of delay is experienced by signals due to the time it takes to transmit a packet serially through a link. This delay is extended by more variable levels of delay due to network congestion. IP network delays can range from a few milliseconds to several hundred milliseconds.
See also
- Age of Information
- End-to-end delay
- Lag (video games)
- Latency (engineering)
- Minimum-Pairs Protocol
- Round-trip delay
References
- "What is latency?". IONOS Digitalguide. Retrieved 2022-08-26.
- S. Bradner, ed. (July 1991). Benchmarking Terminology for Network Interconnection Devices. Network Working Group. doi:10.17487/RFC1242. RFC 1242. Informational.
External links
- Impact of Delay in Voice over IP Services (PDF), retrieved 2018-10-31
- Internet Delay Space Study at Rice University (PDF), retrieved 2018-10-31
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