Jul 17, 2024 • Filed to: Photo/Video/Audio Solutions • Proven solutions
Video buffering is an old enemy of streaming. The irritating loading symbol annoys more when you can't trace its root cause. But that ends today. Because in this post, we'll tackle why videos buffer and how to solve the video buffering issues.
We had to kick off this video-buffering-fix tutorial with video buffering meaning to bring the point home:
Video buffering is a delay at some point while downloading your data but it takes some time before playing your video. And a spinning, loading symbol appearing on the screen.
Buffering is the process of preloading video into a reserved area of memory called a buffer. This way, the streaming service loads video ahead in the background to keep things running smoothly.
Ideal buffer reserves should ensure a smooth playback process with no interruption. However, this isn't always the case. Sometimes you might encounter slow buffering that can't download fast enough to keep pace with playback, thus, pausing the stream.
And there are lots of reasons that causes slow video buffering, including:
At its bottom, buffering problems stem from insufficient internet bandwidth. When internet bandwidth is limited, video file can't download fast enough to keep pace with playback.
In other words, you experience slow video buffering. And internet issues that might be the culprit of buffering problems include:
It is easy to blame your internet. But sometimes you can find video buffering with fast internet. And in such cases, the problem might be on your local computer. It could be:
Other times, the underlying buffering problem might be in your Wi-Fi device. When a Wi-Fi network slows down than usual, you might experience slow video buffering.
While wireless routers are not created equal, they all last a long time. However, the technology that these devices employ might get outdated pretty fast. Meaning if your router is more than 3-years old, it might come in handy to confirm if its specs can support the internet speed you're paying for.
If all else fails, fixing video buffering issues might call lowering the video quality.
Yes, it isn't a cool solution. But sometimes, a video quality might exceed what your internet could support.
Or maybe the server you are trying to stream from might be loading the video slowly, or serving multiple users at a time.
With the causes out of question, how do you fix video buffering on Chrome or any other platform?
Let's find out right now.
Now, if you find yourself greeted by an endless spinning wheel and a "loading" message, instead of your video, there are some fixes you can try.
And depending on the route cause, your approach to the buffering problem will vary. If you don't know where the problem originates from, start with solution one. If it doesn't fix work for your case, move to solution two until you find the right video buffering fix.
Let's get started.
ISPs offer different rates of speed at different prices. And lots of people only go for higher internet connection speed when they need to support multiple users. After all, in a household, everyone should surf the internet even when all devices connect to the network.
But sometimes that slow internet speed. And to ensure your internet speed isn't the culprit, execute an internet speed test. You'll determine if your internet speed measures up and if the ISP is making good of its promise.
Suppose you find that you need more speed. You don't necessarily have to spend more money with your ISP. There are some hacks you can execute to make your internet even faster. They include:
There is no question that Wi-Fi is convenient-at home, in hotel room, or anywhere else. But it doesn't matter how fast a Wi-Fi connection is. It is by no mean a close substitute for hardwired connection.
If you have high internet speed, but you still encounter buffering, you should try a networking cable.
Nearly everyone tends to set up a Wi-Fi router and then forget about it. However, routers need regular maintenance as well to help tackle video buffering issues. Check with your manufacturer for firmware updates. What's more, it might come handy to hard-reset your Wi-Fi once in a while.
It is simple to hard-reset your Wi-Fi connection:
And that's it.
If the reset process does not significantly improve, you might want to upgrade your Wi-Fi device.
When your computer executes many tasks at a go, it might have limited capacity to stream videos without a flaw. Even when you minimize the running application-they still consume system resources.
So, if you have a buffering problem close all the applications you're not using.
However, it isn't easy to know all the programs running in the background-especially those that are not open-or those that start right as soon as you reboot your computer. If you're on a Windows platform, here's a step-by-step guide to stop all the background programs:
Closing all programs dedicates your PC's resources to the app you're using to video stream with.
You might know that the longer the video files, the longer it takes to transmit to your computer or mobile device. And if you can make the files smaller, you won't have to wait for long. The easiest fix would be to watch your video at a lower resolution.
And that's possible on multiple platforms like Netflix and YouTube.
1. Head over to the settings icon on the video. A small window will pop up.
2. On the small pop-up screen, navigate the Quality tab and click on it to display the available resolution then pick on a lower quality.
Sometimes all you need to solve slow buffering is to take a break. Pausing allows the video to build up a bigger buffer to reducing buffering when you resume the play.
It is tempting to restart the video playback after every buffering pause immediately. But it works great if you pause the stream for a few minutes to save you video streaming buffering.
If you're demanding a lot from video streaming-and playing videos does-it calls for up-to-date hardware and drives support.
Intel, Nvidia, and Amd are continually refining and optimizing graphic driver performance, and some driver updates can make a significant difference.
While new drivers are typically faster than the previous models, a version with flaws might slip through but are usually quickly rectified. So, it is essential to have the latest driver.
Multiple devices on the same network consume the bandwidth of the network and cause buffering, primarily when the router cannot support a heavy traffic load.
Therefore, when streaming videos, make sure your internet usage is limited across devices. So power off any internet-connected device that you're not using.
Live streaming has a charm to it. Everyone sticks to watching for long without breaking eyelids until the video buffering fades in.
If you are wondering why does my video keep buffering:
By now, you know several reasons plus the most probable video buffering fixes.
And suppose your video problems exceed prime video buffering, and have a corrupt or not-playing-video file on your local storage, you can fix that too.
Because, there are tools to repair nearly all kinds of video file formats: MP4, AVI, FLV, MOV, M4V, MTS, 3GP, and even more. In fact, you can repair videos that got corrupt while shooting, recording, transferring, converting, and processing.
But you'd ask: Which is the reliable software?
Well, Wondershare Repairit is quite a good choice. There're two versions you could have a try. That's Wondershare Repairit Online Version and Wondershare Repairit Desktop Version. If your corrupted video is less than 200MB, then you could go to the Wondershare Repairit online video repair website because it's totally free and requires no download. Besides, it's super easy to use. Just simply upload the corrupted video files, then wait for the repair process finished.
If you want the more perfect quality of the repaired videos, then you can go to download Wondershare Repairit Video Repair software to your computer. It has proved appropriate-on for any platform-from different storage devices. Mac or Windows are both available.
This begs the question:
How do you use the Wondershare Repairit Video Repair Tool?
Step 1: Download and Install Wondershare Reparit Video Repair
Head over to Wondershare official site and download the correct version of the video repair tool for your pc. There are Mac and Windows versions. Download and install.
Step 2: Launch the Software
After installation, double click on the Wondershare Video Repair icon on the desktop.
This step is the same in both Mac and Windows PC.
Step 3: Add the Corrupted video to the interface
To execute the repair, you'll first add the corrupted video on the software interface. And there are two ways:
Step 4. Repair the Video
After adding the corrupted video successfully, hit the Repair button on your bottom right to initiate the repair process. Once done, click OK on the small windows that will pop up.
You also have the option of previewing the video before saving.
That's how you can repair a corrupt video on Windows and Mac platform with Wondershare Repairit Video Repair Software.
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Eleanor Reed
staff Editor