Quite often we choose the internet connection plans for our home or office based on the internet speed offered (or advertised) by various Internet service providers. It is a known fact that most of the times the actual speed of our internet plan is less than the speed claimed (or advertised) by the corresponding service provider.
Also, in some cases, the internet download or upload speed are not clearly specified in the connection plan that we opt for. So, in order to ensure that we are completely aware of the real internet speeds we are getting on our Linux desktops, we need to use an internet speed measuring tool like Linspeed (only for Ubuntu) or we can test it right from the terminal in any Linux distro.
How to Test Internet Connection Speed on Linux(Ubuntu)
Ubuntu is the Linux Operating system based on Debian and it contains Unity as its own default desktop environment. You would be glad to know that it is possible to test the internet speed on Ubuntu using an open-source GUI tool called ‘Linspeed’. In other words, Linspeed tool helps to measure the real speed of your internet connection on your Linux desktop with Ubuntu OS.
Here is how to install Linspeed tool on Ubuntu and how Linspeed can be used to test internet download/upload speed!
Features of Linspeed
It is able to accurately measure the internet connection speeds from your Linux desktop because of the usage of SpeedOf.Me API. The results of your speed test get displayed as reports which can be easily shared with your internet service provider as well as anyone else. This open-source GUI tool is extremely lightweight and easy to use. Once installed on your Linux desktop, all you need to do is open and click to begin testing. This tool is available in various themes as provided by Linoxide.
Steps to Download Linspeed on Ubuntu Desktop
Though it started out as a tool that worked best with Ubuntu 12.04 version, it can work nicely with other Ubuntu versions as well (Ubuntu 14.04 / 14.10).
Depending on your Ubuntu system architecture (32-bit or 64-bit), you can download the corresponding deb package from SourceForge site for Linspeed. The 32-bit and 64-bit Linspeed files for download can be found at the below Linspeed SourceForge site link: Install 32-bit Linspeed or 64-bit Linspeed from SourceForge Site
After the package is downloaded, double-click on the Ubuntu.deb file to open up Ubuntu Software Center. Now, simply click on install and wait for it to complete. This is a simple process to download Linspeed app on your Ubuntu-powered desktop.
For further details, you can refer the Linspeed Linoxide source at: Linspeed Linoxide Homepage
How to Use Linspeed App After Installation
Once it is successfully downloaded, you can double-click on it to open the Linspeed app.
All you need to do is click on the ‘Begin Test’ option and let the app measure your internet upload speed and download speed. Once the test is completed, the results would be shown in the same app window.
Thus, to start using Linspeed to measure internet speed on Ubuntu, you simply need to follow the above listed steps. It is a very simple tool which won’t utilize any system resources. And it could prove handy when you are facing frequent internet connection problems. What do you think of such a tool for your Linux desktop?
Tip: Connect Internet with Wireless USB Modem in Linux.
How to Test Internet Speed from Linux Terminal
An alternate way to test internet download speed in Linux is to use the ‘wget’ command in terminal. Unlike the above app, you can use this technique in all Linux distros. You simply need to open the terminal from your Linux system and run the below mentioned command.
wget -O /dev/null http://speedtest.wdc01.softlayer.com/downloads/test10.zip
The above command basically helps you perform a test of your internet download speed by pulling some 10 MB file (for example, test10.zip in this case) from a remote server. In reality, since we are pointing the destination path to /dev/null, no file is actually saved on your computer.
In simple words, the downloaded file is destroyed (or discarded) as soon as the installation is complete. However, when the download takes place, you can view the download speed as displayed in the terminal. This allows you to measure the internet download speed available on your Linux PC.
Tip: How to Speed Up Your Slow Internet Connection.
The second method discussed about to test your internet speed in Linux has been around for quite a while. However, not many people know about this trick. I hope you would be able to achieve your goal for internet speed check using either of the two methods discussed above.
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