Jitter
Jitter is the short-term variation of your ping — the difference between one round-trip time and the next.
3 min readReviewed Jul 2026TTML Editorial
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Definition
In depth
Two connections can share the same average ping and feel completely different. Jitter measures how consistent that latency is. Low jitter feels smooth; high jitter feels unpredictable even when the ping number looks fine.
Jitter comes from queueing, wireless retransmission, unstable routing and shared-medium interference. It is often the real culprit behind teleporting characters, missed hits and unpredictable ability responsiveness.
Deep dives
Guides that use Jitter
Related terms
See also
- PingPing is the round-trip time in milliseconds for a packet to travel from your device to the game server and back.
- Packet LossPacket loss is the percentage of network packets that never reach the destination within the expected window.
- BufferbloatBufferbloat is the latency caused when a router's send buffer fills up — a fast line can suddenly feel like a dial-up connection during any upload.
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