IT Glossary
What is bandwidth?
The throughput of a connection: how much data can pass per second — the diameter of the pipe your company’s internet flows through.
Your office internet is a pipe, and bandwidth is its diameter: how much data can flow per second, measured in megabits (Mbps) or gigabits (Gbps). The distinction worth mastering before the next time somebody complains that the network is slow is that bandwidth is not latency. Bandwidth is how wide the pipe is — it governs large transfers such as backups, video and file uploads. Latency is how quickly the water starts moving — it governs video calls and interactive cloud applications, where a delayed reaction annoys people even on an enormous line. Diagnosing the classic office complaint is then simple arithmetic, because the pipe is shared: twenty people on video calls, a backup that started at lunchtime and one colleague uploading large files all tread on each other. The cure is rarely a bigger subscription and usually plain hygiene — check the upload figure separately (consumer-style contracts are famously asymmetric, generous on download and thin on upload, and upload is exactly what carries your calls and backups), schedule backups overnight, make sure the network hardware can carry the contracted throughput at all, and prioritize voice traffic with QoS where calls matter. Then the continuity question every dependent business should answer in advance: what happens when the line drops? A second connection from a different operator, or at minimum 4G/5G failover, costs very little against a day of the company being offline.
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Why it matters for your business
Correct diagnosis, money spent correctly
Once you can tell bandwidth, latency and upload apart, you fix the real cause instead of doubling the subscription when the culprit was a cheap router or a badly timed backup.
Video calls without the “can you hear me?” ritual
Properly sized upload, QoS on voice traffic and hardware that keeps up are the concrete ingredients of online meetings that do not collapse halfway through.
Continuity when the line fails
A backup connection from a different operator keeps payments, email and cloud applications alive during the hours the main line is dead.
Frequently asked questions
How much bandwidth does a company of 10 to 20 people need?
As a rough guide, an ordinary office running cloud apps, email and simultaneous video calls is comfortable in the low hundreds of Mbps, with particular attention to upload — tens of real Mbps as a floor. The consumers that change the maths are cloud backups, media file transfers and cameras uploading recordings. Measure a week of real usage before changing the contract.
Why does the speed test look fine while the applications crawl?
Because the test measures an empty pipe at one instant. The real problem may be latency (cloud apps feel sluggish on a perfect line), Wi-Fi coverage between the tested laptop and reality, one throttled device in the chain, or congestion at peak hours. Serious diagnosis measures over time, on cable and on Wi-Fi separately — not once, at lunchtime.
Is a dedicated guaranteed line worth it instead of a normal business subscription?
Ordinary business subscriptions promise up to a number: shared capacity, no guarantee. Dedicated lines guarantee the throughput with an SLA and defined response times, at several times the price. The crossing point is when a dead connection actually stops production or sales — a call center, tills, your own online services. Until then, two cheaper connections from two different operators often buy more resilience per euro.
Let’s talk about your project
Message us on WhatsApp or send an email — you talk directly to a developer.
office@northdan.com · +40 752 070 247