To effectively monitor network performance, you must know how to troubleshoot multiple types of packet loss, including internet, Wi-Fi and ping problems. This post will teach you about high packet loss. It will also cover several methods for thorough system-level management.
Understanding Packet Loss
Routers efficiently exchange data packets with many devices. This important process occurs during network or internet connections. Packet loss occurs if one or more packets fail to arrive at their destination between the router and the device. The probability of packet loss increases considerably with a greater distance traveled.
Network performance degradation can stem from packets not being received or delivered, leading to slower speeds and a marked reduction in throughput and bandwidth. Packet loss can also have a meaningful economic impact. Organizations spend a considerable amount of money on IT equipment and IT Infrastructure Management equip employees with the necessary tools to achieve high productivity. Therefore, any negative impact on IT equipment and infrastructure can be very costly.
Gartner’s research indicates that IT downtime imposes an average cost of $5,600 per minute on businesses. The cost ranges from $140,000 to $540,000 per hour, depending on the organization’s scale. Therefore, minimizing packet loss will greatly impact the economic success of a company.
What Causes Packet Loss?
Let us look at several factors that cause packet loss:
1. Network Congestion
The most common cause. Like an eight-lane highway during rush hour, when traffic exceeds capacity, packets queue up and the first ones get dropped when the connection is overloaded.
Fix: Prioritize critical traffic with Quality of Service (QoS) rules so voice, video, and business-critical apps get bandwidth first. If congestion is a recurring bottleneck rather than an occasional spike, that points to a capacity problem worth monitoring continuously rather than fixing once.
2. Problems with Network Hardware
Outdated or aging firewalls, routers, and switches lose performance over time. Older endpoint devices with outdated chipsets struggle to keep up with modern network demands.
Fix: Audit hardware age against current traffic load — a switch sized for 2020 traffic volumes will bottleneck under 2026 demand. Replace or upgrade hardware that’s consistently the weak link, and confirm firmware is current before replacing anything.
3. Software Bugs
Bugs in older software versions can cause issues with file transmission, indirectly triggering packet loss during transfers.
Fix: Keep OS and application software patched — most vendors fix transmission-related bugs in routine updates. If packet loss correlates with a specific application version, that’s your root cause, not the network.
4. Software Threats
A packet drop attack occurs when an attacker takes control of a router and instructs it to drop packets from a stream. A sudden, unusually high rate of packet loss in a short window is a red flag for this kind of breach.
Fix: Monitor for sudden spikes in packet loss rate (not just gradual degradation) — a sharp jump is a security signal, not a performance one. Isolate and audit the affected router immediately if this pattern appears.
5. Overloaded Devices
When many services and apps run simultaneously — or when hundreds or thousands of devices connect at scale — devices can’t process and forward packets fast enough, and the temporary buffer holding packets overflows.
Fix: Distribute load across additional access points or gateways rather than concentrating connections on one device. Set alerts for buffer utilization thresholds so you catch overload before packets start dropping, not after.
6. Wired vs Wireless Networks
Wi-Fi connections suffer packet loss far more often than wired ones. With more employees working remotely, traffic that once ran over a stable corporate LAN/WAN now crosses the public internet over wireless links.
Fix: For any traffic where packet loss is costly — VoIP, video conferencing, critical app access — move to a wired connection where possible. Where wireless is unavoidable, check signal strength and interference before assuming it’s a network-wide issue.
7. Faulty Configuration
A simple misconfiguration can cause packet loss, especially as companies merge, divest, or outsource IT staff and configurations drift undocumented. Aging equipment may also be unable to handle modern protocols like SD-WAN.
Fix: Audit configurations against current network documentation, especially after any team, vendor, or infrastructure change. Confirm older hardware actually supports the protocols you’re running before assuming a config error.
How to Monitor for Packet Loss Going Forward
Fixing today’s packet loss is only half the job — without ongoing monitoring, the same causes recur silently. An effective approach covers:
- Conduct Packet Loss Testing: Test regularly across your network infrastructure, especially wireless coverage and known congestion points.
- Measure Packet Loss: Track both real-time and historical data — trend data reveals root causes that a single snapshot misses.
- Pinpoint Causes: Compare packet loss against other network performance metrics like latency and jitter to isolate the real cause rather than guessing from the seven above.
- Troubleshoot in Real Time: Set custom alerts on thresholds so your team is notified before packet loss impacts end users, not after complaints start.
For environments where software-level monitoring isn’t catching everything, hardware-level network TAPs provide 100% packet capture — useful when you need to confirm whether packets are actually being dropped in transit versus a monitoring blind spot.
What are the Effects of Packet Loss?
The effects of packet loss are felt as the performance of a network degrades, and can include the following:
| Lack of Communication Quality | Real-time applications, namely voice over IP (VoIP), experience jitter and frequent gaps in received speech. Packet loss as low as 2% can be noticeable. |
| Reduced Throughput | Packet loss reduces throughput. Some transport layer protocols interpret loss as congestion and adjust transmission rate to avoid it, further slowing speeds. |
| Less Secure Communication | Packet loss can create vulnerabilities that cybercriminals can exploit. For example, VoIP applications can be hacked due to packet loss. |
| Loss of Encrypted Data | Hacked systems due to packet loss may enable cybercriminals to circumvent security measures and steal encrypted data. |
| Packet Drops | Packets experiencing the worst delays may be dropped, reducing overall latency. |
| Incomplete Data | In the worst cases, packet loss can cause severe distortion of received data, such as broken-up images, unintelligible speech or even the complete absence of a received signal. |
Additionally, the impact of packet loss will vary based on the protocol being used:
Conclusion
Packet loss, jitter, and latency are the three biggest obstacles to clear communication across a network, and with hybrid work now the norm, keeping communication lines open matters more than ever. Splitpoint Solutions helps organisations avoid, detect, and resolve these issues in real time across on-premises, cloud, or hybrid environments — see how our application performance monitoring and real-time user monitoring catch packet loss before your users do.
FAQs
1. What is packet loss?
When data is sent over the internet or a network, it is broken down into units of data called packets. Packet loss occurs when a packet fails to arrive at its destination.
2. What does packet loss mean for users?
Packet loss comes in the form of a slow document download, frozen video, or a garbled Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) call. Packet loss will generally reduce the speed or throughput-the actual amount of data that flows through the network-of a given connection.
3. How do I fix packet loss?
Packet loss can be diagnosed with two words: network monitoring. Network monitoring can rapidly and reliably determine the reasons behind packet loss in the enterprise.
4. Can a VPN help with packet loss?
In some cases, a VPN can help mitigate packet loss by providing a more stable and secure connection. However, this is not a guaranteed solution, and network monitoring is still important to identify and diagnose the reasons for packet loss.