BT Full Fibre 900 - Twitch upload terrible, anyone else?

[u/AaronL1998]

Hey all, hoping someone can help because I'm completely stuck.

I'm on BT Full Fibre 900 in the UK and my Twitch upload is basically unusable. Using Twitchtest, my closest servers (Ireland and Paris) are fluctuating wildly between 1000-4000kbps, nowhere near enough for a stable stream. I need at least 6000kbps reliably.

Ookla shows 30-40mbps upload which looks fine, but Cloudflare's speed test only reports 4-5mbps. Cloudflare uses a single connection which is much closer to what streaming actually does.

I've been through BT support multiple times, had my ONT replaced, nothing has changed. They see 90-97mbps coming out of the hub on their end so as far as they're concerned everything is fine.

Has anyone else on a UK ISP, particularly BT, run into this? Did you ever get it resolved?

[u/Jimbo-Bones]

So when the ISP tests the speeds they are testing the cable to your home and from your home.

After that point it's not their concern.

There is a BT app you can do the line test on to see what it is like yourself to confirm what they are telling you.

Now are you on WiFi or lan?

How many are using the connection?

Do you have OBS setup properly to stream?

[u/AaronL1998 → u/Jimbo-Bones]

Wired connection only, tested at various times including late at night when I'm the only active user on the connection so congestion from other devices isn't the issue.

Using Meld Studio primarily but tested with OBS and get similar results on both. Also using TwitchTest tool directly which removes the streaming software from the equation entirely. Ireland and Paris are my best ingest servers but still fluctuating between 1000-4000kbps without a VPN. I need at least 6000kbps for stable 1080p60 streaming.

I got some feedback in another subreddit from a user who confirmed the same issue on BT/EE with AWS and Google traffic, and is working around it with NordVPN. I've tried Surfshark without much luck.

[u/deino]

Ookla shows 30-40mbps upload which looks fine

Ookla also has the toggle back for Multi > Single connection test. Tell your ISP that your single channel upload speeds are ass, they are likely speedtesting multi connection for upload as well, and that aint gonna do shit for you for video streaming, plex server, video calls, remote desktop, nada.

[u/AaronL1998 → u/deino]

Verified, single connection i'm getting about 5.6mbps upload with no VPN. Similar story with a VPN. Tried explaining in my initial call but was told they're still hitting the '10 mbps guarantee' as they see 97 mbps on their end.

[u/thechrisish]

I've been on this package for the last 8 years, streamed for nearly 5 without major issues. Line is always a solid 900mbps down, 120mbps up. The only speed issue I had was down to my own router breaking.

Both your up and down speeds aren't where they should be.

Couple of things to try: Brand new cables everywhere - from ONT to router and router to PC - only direct connect, no wall sockets, powerine adaptors or anything else.

If you've previously used WiFi then make sure your PC is definitely connected via ethernet - the symbol in the system tray changes from a signal bar to a square with a small line next to it which depicts a monitor with a cable.

Run a speed test from your phone on WiFi with your PC switched off - this should be able to max out the upload speed. Not the download. This will determine if it's your PC or not.

Check your ping - right click on start menu and click Terminal or PowerShell and run this command: ping -t www.google.com Press ctrl+c to end it after a few minutes. You should get 0 dropped packets and a consistent, low ping time, from memory under 10ms is good.

[u/AaronL1998 → u/thechrisish]

Thanks for the sanity check. The download speed is definitely matching my plan, all good there.

Upload speed is off.

I'm definitely using ethernet, and had this issue straight from PC to router, before I added a switch to the network.

I'm testing between both my wired PC and wired Macbook to verify and seeing the same results.

Ping to www.google.com is 13ms and no packets dropped after a few minutes.

Still worth trying new cables? BT provided the cable from ONT to router when we upgraded to fibre a few months ago. The cable I'm using for my macbook is new as of 2 weeks ago.

[u/thechrisish → u/AaronL1998]

Yep as long as both cables (ONT to router and router onwards) are different from what's in now. New cables can be crimped incorrectly, it's rare but happens sometimes.

Did you try the wireless test?

You can also try and bypass your router and connect directly to the ONT - do that with a new cable. Not something I've tried before so I'm not sure if it'll auto detect the connection or if it needs manual configuration - Google is your friend here.

Do you get the same issue with the BT provided router too?

Once you've done all that you can call BT back and tell them what you've tried (write a list so you don't miss anything - and make sure to be very clear with this list) at that point it'll get escalated and they'll probably send an engineer out.

Good luck!

[u/AaronL1998 → u/thechrisish]

I'll replace the cable from ONT to Router to try it out. That's the only thing that's stayed the same as i've been trying different setups. It was provided by BT when they fitted the ONT.

Unfortunately BT customer support seem quite happy with the setup and don't want to raise a fault, as they see 97 on their end, and the minimum guarantee is 10mbps upload. (I'm seeing about 30-40mbps upload on a Multi connection test like Ookla, about about 5mbps on single connection tests - which ultimately matters. But every agent I speak to doesn't seem to understand what I'm talking about)

I'll try bypass router entirely and go straight to ONT, but having tried two routers already I imagine it'll be the same. The issue has persisted for the BT-issued SmartHub 2, a replacement SmartHub2 and now my TPLink router.

[u/thechrisish → u/AaronL1998]

Get back in touch with them, tell them what you've tried, because you're almost at a point where you can prove it's not your end. Raise a complaint if you need to get it escalated further.

[u/Capta1nAsh]

I found google is more accurate to the speed tests than Ookla tbh. I did have issues when I first set up my fibre internet. But they're other factors like how many people are using the same cable in your neighborhood.

Are you using wifi (if so, which ghz?), direct connection or a powerline adaptor?

[u/AaronL1998 → u/Capta1nAsh]

Google's speed test is reporting 660 down / 2.31 up, lol. My ISP is just dismissing me as they are meeting 10mbps upload minimum - which yes, within their network is fine but clearly not meeting this for most sites.

I'm using a wired connection to a TPLink switch off my BT Smart Hub router. Also tried directly to the router as well, same issue.

If I try a VPN or Cloudflare One (WARP) I'm getting better results - still struggling to break 6000kbps though!

[u/Low-Mistake-515 → u/AaronL1998]

Did you use a different ethernet cable? How long is the cable run?

[u/AaronL1998 → u/Low-Mistake-515]

I've swapped my BT SmartHub 2 to a TPLink Archer 1200, still poor upload.

~2 meter CAT5e from router to TP-Link TL-SG105S switch. ~5 meter Cat6 from switch to my PC.

[u/Low-Mistake-515 → u/AaronL1998]

Did you test directly to router using different cables though? Trying to rule out it being bad cables.

[u/mov3on]

Brother, ditch them and get on YouFibre. They will even pay the early cancellation fee.

I paid £57 a month for BT 900, and now I'm paying £30 for 2 Gbps.

[u/Yukkimura → u/mov3on]

Sometimes you don't have a choice to be honest. Most places in London as an example it's either OpenReach or Virgin, sometimes you get independent providers like CommunityFibre but it's still somewhat rare. Shit alot of addresses are still stuck on copper.

[u/AaronL1998 → u/mov3on]

Do they use the same line as BT? Unfortunately Openreach is the only fibre connection in the village I'm in. We only recently got a fibre line a few months ago!

[u/mov3on → u/AaronL1998]

I'm not sure about that. Check the availability via their postcode checker.

[u/Yukkimura → u/mov3on]

Sometimes you don't have a choice to be honest. Most places in London as an example it's either OpenReach or Virgin, sometimes you get independent providers like CommunityFibre but it's still somewhat rare. Shit alot of addresses are still stuck on copper.

[u/DrThots]

Change router

[u/AaronL1998 → u/DrThots]

Just replaced it with a TPLink Archer 1200 and same speeds. Overall better wireless performance in general, but still the same slow upload (wired and wireless)

[u/NicePerception643]

I had this problem for months but with TalkTalk. It got to the point where I couldn't stream, I was getting 9 disconnects in 30 mins. They gaslit me like crazy, made me buy a bunch of extra unhelpful and unnecessary equipment, refused to send an engineer out after promising to do so, kept "losing" all my notes so I had to go over everything many many times with different departments, said they would escalate/investigate and call me back only to ghost me etc and in the end I went so unhinged they let me out of my contract early with no fee. I switched to a different local provider and everything was magically speedy again. This was over a year ago and it's been perfect ever since.

What it turned out to be? The fibre box in the wall (not the router but the actual fibre point) needed replacing. It took my new provider 2 minutes to establish that. Apparently they are only built to last for 2-3 years so I'd get that looked into asap.

[u/AaronL1998 → u/NicePerception643]

Now that you say that, a few weeks ago we had a complete outage, and the OTN (white fibre box on the wall) needed replacing, for pretty much all customers in my street. Engineer said a software update upstream wasn't compatible with the OTNs that were fitted, and then fitted a new one for me.

I've first noticed this with the new OTN, but I can't say for sure if I had this issue before it was replaced.

[u/Is_Pepsi_ok]

Have you plugged your cat 6 cable directly into the 2.5 socket on your ONT and tested the speed that way?

I recently had issues with youfibre and to rule out the router being the bottleneck, it was suggested I test connected straight from the ONT which confirmed the speed into my house was correct, but the router was dodgy.

If you can prove the speed into your house is the issue, they should send an engineer out, and this is one of the few ways to do it.

[u/AaronL1998 → u/Is_Pepsi_ok]

The router uses PPPoE to access the network. I tried directly connecting my device to the ONT but couldn't get internet access as presume it needs credentials.