How Fast is 600 kbps? What can you really do with it

Everyone wants high-speed internet, including you and me, but in reality, getting really fast internet reliably is an issue for many people.

This is more evident when you use the internet from your phone connection, either through a hotspot or on the phone.

In my case, my data cap ran out before the end of the month, which resulted in my ISP throttling my speeds.

The speeds were noticeably different from when I was using broadband, so I ran a speed test to confirm if this was the case.

The test showed me that my internet had a speed of 600 Kbps or thereabouts, which instantly prompted me to find out if this was usable to get me through the rest of the month.

To determine if 600 Kbps was good enough, I did a few more real-world tests like streaming, gaming online, and downloading large files.

I also performed speed tests in different scenarios to see if my internet was fast enough for all use cases.

After reading this guide, you will have a thorough understanding of how fast 600 Kbps is and if it is fast enough for today’s uses.

600 Kbps is pretty slow by today’s standards, and as a result, you would struggle to do anything more than casual browsing and messaging.

Don’t worry if you have a 600 Kbps connection, though, because you can read on to find more about what you can and can’t do with such a connection and how to make the most of it.

What is Internet Speed?

Think of the internet as a freeway and the data that travels through it to different places like vehicles on the freeway.

The speeds these cars or data travel matter since it ultimately impacts how long the data takes to reach its destination.

The speeds of the cars is analogous to the internet speed that we are talking about and is measured by how much data can be transferred from the source to the destination per second.

A unit of data is called a bit, and eight of those are called a byte.

For simplicity’s sake, almost all data is measured in bytes, as is the case for internet speed.

The units start from bytes per second, all the way up to gigabytes per second and higher depending on how large the data is.

Having a high speed makes working on the internet faster and makes the stuff that you do with the internet a lot more responsive.

How Does a Lower Internet Speed Hinder You?

Higher internet speeds are always advised to keep your tasks on the internet responsive and quick, but what happens when these speeds drop?

Low internet speeds mean that data takes longer to reach its destination, slowing everything down and increasing the time a system responds to a message.

They also impact your experience when you are downloading files, especially really large ones.

What should have been done in 15-20 minutes would take 2-3 hours if speeds drop down.

The list of stuff you can do on the internet will also shrink a lot if your internet speeds drop since most of the fun stuff needs really good internet to work properly.

How Fast is 600kbps?

Megabit and Gigabit internet are the most popular internet connections that ISPs offer, and most mobile internet plans have speeds in these ranges.

They are really fast and offer a good balance between speed and costs, where speeds range from the low 10s of megabits and up to 1 gigabit per second.

But a speed of 600 Kbps or 0.6 Mbps is neither fast nor reliable, and most modern internet services would end up dropping connections or important data when they are on a network with a speed of 600 Kbps.

Most streaming services, including Netflix and Hulu, recommend at least a speed of 5 Mbps for SD or 480p, which is the lowest stream quality they offer.

The same goes for games, with most consoles and game developers recommending at least 3 Mbps to play the more competitive multiplayer titles online.

600 Kbps is pretty slow by modern standards and was pretty slow even five to six years ago.

Browsing the Internet on a 600kbps Plan

Casual internet browsing is almost the only thing a 600 Kbps plan is good at, but you run into issues when visiting modern websites even there.

Newer websites have a lot of interactive content and media compared to older websites, and they need the extra bandwidth for the website to work properly.

Most of the websites that I visited as part of the test had broken images and elements, with some stuck and eternally loading.

Overall, the experience was really bad, with the only good one being visiting a really old forum that I used to frequent in my teenage years, but that can be put down more to nostalgia rather than the speed of my internet.

Downloading Files on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Downloading was, on the whole, another plane of frustration, with most downloads that I tried from my browser failing midway, and the ones that did complete took way too long to finish up.

You can forget about downloading files that have sizes in the gigabytes because that means you need to keep the download on for several hours or even days to finish one download.

I tried downloading a few games I had in my library on my PC and my console, and the estimated completion times for all downloads were greater than 10 hours; these downloads were tested separately, mind you, which means all downloads had the maximum bandwidth possible.

With a 1-gigabyte file taking up to 4 hours to finish, provided I had a consistent speed of 600 Kbps (which was not the case most of the time), it proved to be frustrating.

Downloading smaller files under 100-300 megabytes was still slow but was tolerable.

I would only advise you to download smaller files like your documents, images, PDFs or small ZIP files.

Listening to Spotify on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Fortunately, you get some respite from using Spotify on a 600 Kbps connection because Spotify’s highest quality is 320 Kbps.

With this internet, you can get an enjoyable experience streaming music on Spotify.

Downloading music through Spotify is still a pain and takes a long time, especially if the playlist or album that you are downloading is pretty large.

My playlist, which had almost 120 tracks, took almost half an hour to complete at the highest quality.

Overall, streaming is quite possible through Spotify, even at the highest quality, but downloading from Spotify still takes more time than it should.

Watching YouTube on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Google recommends a speed of 700 Kbps sustained to watch YouTube at standard definition 360p.

So a connection with a speed of 600 Kbps can only stream at a quality of 240p or lower without the video stopping to buffer every few seconds.

As you would expect, 240p is not a recommended video quality since you’d struggle to make out any fine details in the video.

It becomes ten times worse when you try to watch sports or other content that are pretty fast.

The low quality, combined with YouTube’s compression that prioritizes stationary objects, messes up the video and makes it unwatchable.

I could barely make out who the teams were during a fast-paced moment of a sports highlight video I tested.

Action content also suffered, with everything on the screen almost melding together when the camera moved around a lot.

I would not suggest you watch YouTube with a connection with a speed of 600 Kbps.

Watching Netflix on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Watching Netflix was close to impossible with a 600 Kbps connection.

I counted myself lucky when the main page loaded in and didn’t time out because it took too long.

Netflix recommends a speed of at least 3 Mbps to watch content at SD 480p.

So a speed of 600 Kbps is close to impossible to stream with, and if you manage to start watching a show or a movie, prepare to stare at the buffering symbol for a long time.

Downloading, on the other hand, is quite possible but slow.

You can download a show onto your device to watch later, and that is the only thing I’d recommend you do on Netflix with a 600 Kbps internet connection.

Gaming on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Gaming is a mixed bag, though, but you can make the most of what you got.

Downloading a pretty large game and in the gigabytes file size range is possible but would take a lot of time, so if you are patient enough, you can try.

With the connection taking upto 4 hours to download 1 gigabyte, I’d advise you to download smaller games in file size.

As a result, downloading games with that connection is not perfect, but it works.

After you download the game, you won’t have to bother about your internet speeds anymore unless the game needs to be online or has competitive multiplayer modes.

Most games of today need to be online all the time as part of its protection against privacy. If you cannot guarantee a reliable internet connection, the connection to the game’s servers can time out and even log you out of the game altogether.

Competitive games like Valorant or Apex Legends are unplayable because of the slow speeds, and both games recommend you have at least 10 Mbps internet to have the best experience possible.

Zoom Calls on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Zoom recommends an internet connection with speeds of at least 150 Kbps, but that’s just for 1-on-1 calls without video.

If you and the recipient have their cameras turned on, you would need at least a speed of 1.1 Mbps to see and hear each other properly.

Group calls need even more speeds from at least 25 to 50 Mbps.

I tested the call quality with all these cases and found the results to be along these lines.

1-on-1 calls sounded okay and responsive, but as soon as someone turned the video on, the person I was on the call with started to lag and stutter.

They reported after the call that it was an issue on my end, and their internet wasn’t the one having issues.

I would only recommend doing 1-on-1 calls with Zoom at a speed of 600 Kbps.

Using Smartphone Apps on a 600kbps Internet Plan

I connected my phone to the 600 Kbps connection to check how apps worked on the network.

The regular messaging apps like iMessage, Snapchat and Messenger, worked well, although it took longer than usual to load pictures, and videos almost refused to work.

Other network-intensive apps like Netflix, YouTube and some competitive games had issues running on the network.

Casual internet browsing and scrolling through main text-based social media was alright, and Spotify and Apple Music worked well.

How Does your Data Cap Affect your Internet Usage?

Having a data cap means that you become more “responsible” about your internet usage.

You will always hold back on downloading large files or streaming at really high qualities if a data cap sits at the back of your mind.

Most ISPs throttle your internet speeds after going over their data caps, and they do it to reduce the ISP’s network load.

This ensures that all users on the network get to use their fair share of bandwidth and penalizes those who go over the limit.

Using the Internet on Multiple Devices on a 600kbps Internet Plan

Multiple devices are a nightmare to use on a slow 600 Kbps connection because each device vies for bandwidth.

Using internet heavy applications on all those devices will be close to impossible.

Regular browsing and other things that were easier to do in a 600 Kbps connection also become more difficult and frustrating to do when there are multiple devices.

So if you have a 600 Kbps connection, avoid connecting too many devices to it.

How to Make the Most of your 600kbps Internet Plan

But its not all doom and gloom if you are stuck with using a 600 Kbps connection.

There are some things you can try to enhance your experience on a slower connection.

To make the most of your 600kbps internet plan, you can:

Watch YouTube at a lower quality.
Turn data saver mode on all of your devices.
Install a data usage tracker like Glasswire or use the built-in tracker to see how much data you’ve used.
Use the Lite versions of the apps you use. They need less bandwidth, but you can access most of the primary features without needing fast internet.
Stream at a lower quality on streaming services.
Download small games to keep you occupied that are under 400 megabytes.

Final Thoughts

If you can manage to use a 600 Kbps internet plan well and make the most out of it, you can prove that you don’t need the near-mythical speeds that NASA is said to have to get stuff done.

If you are on CenturyLink and want to make your internet faster, there is something you can try to make your internet speed faster.

You can try updating the firmware of your router or try resetting it.

You can also try upgrading your old router into something new, like a mesh router that has Wi-Fi 6.

These routers are faster than regular routers and can accommodate more devices as well.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is 600 kbps fast enough for zoom?

600 Kbps is only good enough for Zoom if you do 1-on-1 calls with the video turned off.

Any other case would require higher internet speeds.

How many kbps is considered fast?

If your internet speeds in Kbps is higher than 1300-2000 Kbps, your internet connection can be considered fast.

How much data does a 1-hour Zoom video call use?

A 1-hour group video call on Zoom takes up about 800-900 Megabytes of data.

1-on-1 calls can use up to 500 megabytes to 1.5 gigabytes.

How many GB does Facebook use per hour?

Facebook, on average, would only use about 100 megabytes per hour of use but can change if you watch a lot of videos.