12 May How Much Bandwidth Does Your Business Really Need?
Understanding your bandwidth requirements—also known as the data rate that your internet connection supports—as a business is essential to ensuring you have the appropriate connectivity and capabilities for your operations.
After all, you don’t want to pay for bandwidth you don’t need, but you also don’t want to be limited if you underestimate your requirements.
So how much bandwidth does your business really need? Here are a few tips to help you determine your requirements and if your current setup is able to meet them.
Know Your Business Applications and Their Minimum Bandwidth
Each application your business utilizes has a bandwidth that it is using as well. The application will use a specific number of megabits per second (Mbps), so knowing and adding your application requirements will let you know your minimum bandwidth.
There are a few ways to determine the requirements of each application. First, consider tasks done at your company that require the internet. A network analyzer, bandwidth estimator, or list of common tasks and their bandwidth requirements can help you determine a rough estimate for each one so you can total them.
For example, uploading a large file may take 2 Mbps, while video conferencing can take 4. There may be many tasks that your business does every day that require the internet, so it’s safer to overestimate than underestimate.
Know How Many Devices Are on Your Network
After you know the bandwidth requirements of your applications, the next step is to determine how many devices and users are on your network.
This step is the most important in determining bandwidth requirements because it will help you determine how many people, theoretically, are doing all of these tasks at once and how much bandwidth is necessary to support that.
So, for example, if your team does video conferencing (which takes an average of 4 Mbps) and you have 10 people on your team, you would need a minimum bandwidth of 40 Mbps just for video. When you factor in other tasks, generally 100 Mbps of bandwidth is necessary for small businesses.
Determine the Right Codecs for Your Phone System
The codec of a phone system refers to the compression and depression of audio, which can help transfer audio without a large bandwidth. Choosing the proper codecs allows businesses to lower their bandwidth requirements while maintaining a high-quality connection.
Data is lost when compressing audio or video, which can affect call quality and your business operations. Therefore, knowing how much bandwidth you have available is important so you can choose the right codec for your phone and video systems to maintain high audio and video call quality.
NewConnect Makes Connectivity Simple
With NewConnect, customers don’t have to worry about determining bandwidth because we provide up to a gigabyte along with free gig bursting, so you don’t have to guess what bandwidth you need or struggle when your ISP doesn’t meet your requirements. We provide maximum connectivity and speed, whether you use it or not. Find out more about our fast internet solutions by contacting us today.
