You can now use Speedtest to determine whether you can stream Black Widow in 4K
Being able to keep track of your internet speeds is helpful and all, but that doesn’t exactly tell you the entire story for whatever network you are connected to. Notably, video streaming is pretty taxing on your network, regardless of if you’re streaming over Wi-Fi or using your cellular network. Ookla has announced a new feature available with its Speedtest app that will now show you the best video resolution based on what your network can handle.
The Video Testing feature was first made available for iOS users earlier this year, but Ookla has confirmed that the feature has arrived for Android users. The way that this feature works is that you tap the Video icon in the bottom toolbar, and then a series of videos will be played. The resolution of these videos continues to increase, helping to determine what the best resolution is based on your network speeds.
Ookla also provided a few other reasons as to why you might want to test video streaming speeds, even if you’re not planning on watching a video at that moment:
- Find out whether your network is giving you the expected video quality playback
- Get recommendations for which devices will work best for video on your network
- Compare historical streaming experiences to your current network performance with test result history
- Investigate potential outages of the services you are trying to use with Ookla’s Downdetector if you find that you are unable to stream your video even when the test finds that your video streaming quality meets or exceeds the resolution supported by your device
This may not be something that you thought you would need, but Ookla’s Speedtest app has become the de-facto option when it comes to testing network speeds. But running a run-of-the-mill network speed test doesn’t always account for all of the variables, especially when it comes to streaming video. After the test is completed, you’ll be provided with suggestions as to what devices to use to stream videos based on the results of the test.
The update is available today and can be downloaded either from the Google Play Store, or the Amazon App Store.