’22 Resolution: No More Video Chat Hiccups

8 min readJan 4, 2022

Ah, the dreaded video conference lag, hiccups and/or freezing. The work from home equivalent of B.O.

Below is a plain language write up of what might be going on and step-by-step instructions to diagnose and fix common problems. It’s a longer read but when your video meetings are smooth and professional… hopefully worth it!

(TL:DR ? — just read the section about your home network)

Video conferencing is a different animal. When you’re browsing the internet or watching Netflix, your machine loads data in the background allowing it to invisibly smooth over most disruptions that occur. Unfortunately, you don’t have this luxury with live streaming. Faults make themselves known in real time.

Since you’re only as strong as the weakest link in your chain, let’s tackle this piece by piece…

1 — The Internet

What: the actual servers that are hosting your video chat or internet content. Stalwarts like Google, Facebook and Netflix run their own. Other folks rely on massive 3rd parties like AWS, Google Cloud or Microsoft Azure to be their internet. Believe it or not, these internet backbone servers can occasionally go down or get disrupted. Services like down detector track this.

Could this be my problem? Very unlikely the case for persistent video chat issues.

Fixes: You’re SOL. Luckily this is super rare.

2 — Your Internet Service Provider (ISP)

What: This is the company you pay to bring the internet to your home. Comcast, Cox, Spectrum. Not all “internet” is the same. Fiber optic cable (aka Fiber) is capable of much faster speeds and lower latency (the time it takes to ask for the data) than coaxial cable. Cable internet is showing its limitations, especially in a WFH world. Certain countries, towns, neighborhoods or apartment buildings can actually receive less “internet” from an ISP than others. Also your ISP will reduce your share of available bandwidth based on the overall network load in your neighborhood, building, etc. in any given moment.

Which do you have? If the wire that goes into your modem is the same kind that can screw into a TV, you’ve got cable (the most common).

Could this be my problem? Very possible if you have cable internet. Do your video chats seem fine sometimes but super slow at other times? Your ISP might be to blame. Try running a speed test at different times during the day. Here’s the holy trinity you’re looking for:

These three requirements work together so if even one is out of the ideal range, it will result in issues. And if you are consistently getting good test speeds but still suffer random spotty video conferencing, it’s a good indication that something might be up with your network (see the next section)

Fixes:

1) Increase your internet speed, if possible. Check to see what plan you are on. If it’s a lower tier plan, you might want to consider upgrading. If fiber is available in your area, it’ll be a massive improvement, “instant internet”. If you can get speed tests below your plan’s promise, complain to your ISP and they might bump your bandwidth.

2) Reduce your bandwidth demands elsewhere during video chats. Are you downloading/uploading something big? Kids playing online games? Roommates mining crypto? See if they can pause during important video chats. (The bandwidth your ISP promises is for the entire house, not just the laptop you are video chatting on.) More on this later.

3 — Your Local Network (aka “what’s your wifi?”)

Spoiler alert! This is very likely where you can make the biggest impact on your streaming quality!

What: Your local network is what connects the internet bandwidth available from your ISP to your devices. It is made up of a couple different parts:

a modem that receives “the internet” from the ISP
a wifi router that both creates a wireless network and decides which devices to prioritize and when.
Sometimes your modem and wifi router are contained in the same device.
If you have a “mesh network” you will have multiple wifi hotspots.

It’s important to understand that a wifi network uses radio waves to transfer data back and forth through the air. This signal can get blocked or disrupted. When the signal strength of your network is low, it can be hard for your devices to communicate quickly with the internet. Imagine listening to old school radio on a roadtrip and driving far into the country — at a certain point it just gets shitty and impossible to listen to.

Additionally, your wifi network can have interference from other nearby wifi networks and devices on similar radio channels — like back in the day when you were on a cordless phone and the signal got jumbled if someone ran the blender. “Noise” in your radio bandwidth also makes it harder (aka slower) for your devices to communicate with the internet.

Could this be my problem? There is a high likelihood you can make big improvements to your internet & video chat quality by optimizing your local network.

Fixes:

1) Hardwire your laptop into your modem or router! This is the #1 way to quickly and easily get the absolute best video chat performance from your network. If that cable box is near your desk, you’re in luck. If not, here’s a 50ft ethernet for $13. You’ll need either an ethernet to USB ($13) or ethernet to USB-C ($15) as well. The good news is, this should be plug and play. Just connect the cables, turn off your laptop wifi and give your computer a restart for good measure. Viola!

Try running a speed test before and after, the results could be dramatic. BONUS: you will now have a benchmark to test your wifi devices against.

2) Make sure your network is 5GHz — With the explosion of devices and wifi networks these days older 2.4ghz wifi networks likely have interference– especially if you’re in an apartment complex or in an urban area. Interference jumbles the signal and makes your device work harder to send/receive “internet” another culprit of bad video chat quality.

How can you you check? From your Mac laptop, connected to your home network, hold down the option key and click the wifi icon in the top menu bar. This will give you network detail. Make sure the channel says 5GHz. (see below).

Also, some wifi routers create networks with both signals. Ex.

“home_wifi 2G” and “home_wifi_5GHz”

Always pick 5G and even “forget” the 2G in your wifi settings to ensure you don’t accidentally join it. (2.4GHz will die a slow death because many old devices can’t connect to 5G)

3) Use a new-ish wifi router — Your wifi router might be built into the modem provided by your ISP or it might be a separate device (ex. Linksys, Netgear) you plug in. If either is more than four or five years old, you should think about replacing it. Older routers likely have weaker signals, operate on more crowded frequencies, less compatible protocols to new devices, etc.

4) Set up a mesh network if you have a big place. Do you notice you get a better connection or speed in some rooms vs. others? A mesh network gives you repeaters that amplify the signal at different points to give you consistent, fast speeds & coverage. This Nest/Google product page gives a nice visual explanation as to how it works (and is a good one to consider, too).

5) Limit / prioritize the bandwidth hogs. If you have people connected to your network that engage in bandwidth intensive stuff like concurrent video chats, online gaming, video streaming… you might want to set limits for them or prioritize your work devices. Newer networks like Google/Nest have apps that make it easy.

4 — Your Hardware / Devices

What: Video conferencing is what the IT tech nerd world calls “resource intense.” It takes a decent amount of CPU, GPU (graphics processing unit) and RAM memory to pull off video streaming smoothly.

Could this be my problem? Maybe. If you’re on a newer laptop that’s just a couple years old, you should be covered on CPU/GPU. Even so, if you have a bunch of tabs open and/or running many other applications, your RAM could be full. (Likewise with mobile/tablet — if on the newer side, you should be ok)

To check to see if CPU/GPU/RAM is an issue during a video chat, open up Activity Monitor and see.

Hold down command + space bar (this opens search)
Type “Activity Monitor” (open it)
Look at the bottom chart on both CPU and Memory — you can see if you’re in the red zone

Fixes:

Kill your tabs — Chrome is a notorious resource hog. Kill all unnecessary tabs.

Kill programs — like shutting tabs down, keep open programs to a minimum, especially resource intense ones like Photoshop, After Effects, iMove, etc.

Pro tip! Hit Command + Tab and you can see what is open! Each time you hit tab, you advance to the next and can also command + Q to kill it. Super fast.

Restart your computer — Got an important investor Zoom for all the marbles? Give your machine a restart in advance. That will clear out all the random phantom stuff hanging out in your RAM.

5 — Software Settings

What: Holy shit! You made it all the way to the end. Gold star. The final link in the chain is your software settings. Below are a couple to pay attention to.

Google Meet

Under Settings → Video, consider setting your send & receive to “auto.” Google will then upgrade and downgrade you if your bandwidth fluctuates. If you know you have semi-frequent issues, you might just want to lock it at the lower range (360p)