DNS Speed TestIs your DNS
slowing you down?

Times how quickly 16 public resolvers answer from your own browser, compares them against the one you are using now, and reports what it finds. Nothing to install.

No sign-up. Results appear on screen in full — sending yourself a copy is optional.

Example result — not a live measurement

ANothing needed attention16 resolvers · 544 queries · about 13s

Fastest in each category

No filtering

Cloudflare — Unfiltered8 ms

1.1.1.1 · 1.0.0.1

Blocks malware and phishing

Quad9 — Secured14 ms

9.9.9.9 · 149.112.112.112

Blocks ads and trackers

Control D — Malware and ads19 ms

76.76.2.2 · 76.76.10.2

Blocks adult content

Cloudflare — Malware and adult11 ms

1.1.1.3 · 1.0.0.3

Reading Your Results

Reading a DNS speed test — what each number means

Most DNS tests report one average and stop. An average hides the thing you actually notice, which is the occasional slow lookup. Here is what this test reports and why each one is on the page.

Cached vs first-time — the gap is the interesting part

Cached lookups use names the resolver already holds, so almost none of the time is work — that figure is effectively your latency to it, mostly a function of distance. First-time lookups use names nobody has ever requested, forcing a full recursion out to the authoritative servers. A resolver that is physically close but poorly connected upstream looks fast on the first number and slow on the second. Most tools only measure the cached case.

Median, not average

The middle value: half the queries were faster, half slower. An average is dragged around by a single outlier — nine lookups at 20 ms and one at 500 ms averages 68 ms, which describes none of them. The median stays 20 ms, which is what the connection actually felt like.

95th percentile — the slow tail

Ninety-five percent of lookups finished within this time. It is the number that matches the moments you notice, because you do not remember the fast ones. A resolver with a 20 ms median and a 400 ms 95th percentile feels unreliable; one at 30 ms median and 45 ms feels solid.

Variation between queries

How much each lookup differed from the one before it. Steady beats fast-on-average: a resolver holding 18 ms consistently feels quicker than one averaging 15 ms with regular jumps to 100 ms, because the jumps are what you perceive.

Success rate, shown as 12/12

How many lookups actually returned an answer. This matters more than it looks: public resolvers rate limit bursts, and one that answered a single query still produces a median. Without the count, a lucky sample looks exactly as trustworthy as twelve real ones. Anything under five successful lookups is excluded from ranking entirely.

Twelve hostnames, not one

Each cached round queries a different popular domain. Repeating a single name measures one cache entry on one server twelve times, so a resolver that is quick for google.com and slow for everything else would score perfectly. Expand any row to see the per-hostname timings.

Methodology

DNS speed test methodology, and what it cannot see

Every speed test makes choices that change its results. Most bury them. Here are ours, including the things this test genuinely cannot measure — a tool that hides its limits is not one you should trust with a decision.

How it measures

Runs entirely in your browser over DNS-over-HTTPS (RFC 8484 wireformat). Browsers cannot send UDP on port 53, so these figures sit above what a desktop tool reports — every resolver is measured the same way, so the comparison holds even though the absolute numbers do not match a port 53 benchmark.
Twelve different widely-used hostnames for cached timing, one per round, rather than the same name repeatedly.
First-time timing uses randomly generated names that have never existed, so no resolver anywhere can have them cached and each must complete a real recursion.
Every resolver is queried in the same instant each round, so a momentary network stall lands on all of them equally instead of penalising whichever happened to go first.
Rounds are spread across roughly ten seconds rather than fired in a burst, so the result samples a window of time instead of one instant — and is less likely to trip rate limiting.
A resolver that returned too few answers is excluded from ranking rather than ranked on a lucky sample.
Ad and tracker blocking was verified by probe. Malware and adult-content claims are what the operator states, and are labelled separately — this tool does not audit blocklists.

What it cannot see

Only resolvers whose DoH endpoint permits cross-origin requests can be measured at all. AdGuard, OpenDNS, Mullvad and NextDNS answer normally but send no CORS header, so a browser cannot read their responses and they cannot appear here.
The resolver your own machine uses frequently cannot be measured — browsers withhold that timing in many privacy configurations and for connections that were already open. When that happens the result says so rather than estimating.
Nothing inside your building is visible. Wi-Fi signal, switches, and cabling all sit past where a browser can see, and they cause far more everyday slowness than DNS does.
No ICMP ping, jitter, or packet loss. Browsers cannot send ICMP at all, and the honest alternative needs a dedicated endpoint that is not deployed yet.
One measurement, from one browser, at one moment. Response times shift with location, time of day, and the network you are on — re-run it a few times before drawing conclusions.

What this test measures

Cached response timeHow quickly each resolver answers for a name it already holds in memory.
First-time lookupsTiming for names never requested before, which forces a resolver to do the full lookup.
The resolver you use nowWhether any tested resolver answered faster than the one this device is currently using.
How your domain is publishedOptional. Nameserver redundancy, DNSSEC signing, and certificate issuance policy on a domain you own.
Resolver behaviorWhether the tested resolvers reject a deliberately invalid DNSSEC signature and agree with each other.

Every result says what it means and what it does not, including when a measurement could not be completed.

Does this measure my connection or your server?

Yours. The measurements run in your browser and travel over your own network, router, and internet connection. The only parts handled by our server are checks on how a resolver or a domain behaves, which give the same answer no matter who asks.

What does DNS speed actually change?

DNS is the lookup that turns a name into an address. It happens once before a site starts loading, so a slow resolver shows up as a pause before anything appears — which reads as a slow connection even when the connection is fine. What it will not change is your bandwidth. If large downloads crawl or video buffers midway through, DNS is not the cause and switching resolvers will not help.

Is this measuring latency, or how long the lookup takes?

Both, and the two columns separate them. Every figure is the complete round trip from your browser: the time to reach the resolver, plus whatever work it does, plus the time for the answer to come back. The "cached" column uses names the resolver already holds in memory, so almost none of it is work — that figure is effectively your latency to that resolver, and it is mostly a function of distance. The "first-time" column uses names nobody has ever asked for, which forces a full lookup out to the authoritative servers, so it adds the resolution work on top. A resolver that is close but poorly connected shows a fast cached time and a slow first-time one.

Why are these numbers higher than my old DNS benchmark tool?

Desktop tools query resolvers over plain UDP on port 53. A browser cannot do that, so this test uses DNS-over-HTTPS, which adds encryption and HTTP overhead on top of the lookup. Every resolver is compared under identical conditions, so the ranking is meaningful even though the absolute numbers sit higher than a desktop tool would report.

Can it measure ping, jitter, and packet loss?

Not yet. Browsers cannot send ICMP ping packets at all, and the honest alternative — measuring real UDP round trips the way a game does — needs a dedicated endpoint we have not deployed. When it exists, this page will report round-trip time, jitter, and packet loss alongside the DNS results.

Should I change my DNS resolver based on this?

Only after thinking it through. A faster resolver reduces the wait before a new site starts loading; it does not increase bandwidth. On a business network the resolver often handles internal names, filtering, or split-DNS, so changing it can break things that have nothing to do with speed.

Why does it say it cannot measure my current resolver?

Browsers only report DNS timing in specific conditions, and some privacy settings suppress it entirely. When the measurement is unavailable the check says so rather than guessing, because a made-up number would be worse than no number.

Do you store my results?

Not unless you ask us to. Results are calculated in your browser and shown there. If you enter your email to receive a copy, we store that summary so our team can follow up. See the privacy policy for the detail.

Everything looks fine but my internet still feels slow. What now?

That is a useful result, not a dead end. This check only sees from your network card outward, so it is blind to Wi-Fi signal problems, an overloaded switch, or aging cabling — and those cause far more everyday slowness than DNS does. A clean result here narrows the search to inside the building. Calling us at (580) 448-0440 is a reasonable next step.

Built and maintained by Distributed Network Solutions. Call (580) 448-0440 if you want someone to read the results with you.

Reading a DNS speed test — what each number means

Most DNS tests report one average and stop. An average hides the thing you actually notice, which is the occasional slow lookup. Here is what this test reports and why each one is on the page.

Cached vs first-time — the gap is the interesting part

Median, not average

95th percentile — the slow tail

Variation between queries

Success rate, shown as 12/12

Twelve hostnames, not one

DNS speed test methodology, and what it cannot see

How it measures

Runs entirely in your browser over DNS-over-HTTPS (RFC 8484 wireformat). Browsers cannot send UDP on port 53, so these figures sit above what a desktop tool reports — every resolver is measured the same way, so the comparison holds even though the absolute numbers do not match a port 53 benchmark.
Twelve different widely-used hostnames for cached timing, one per round, rather than the same name repeatedly.
First-time timing uses randomly generated names that have never existed, so no resolver anywhere can have them cached and each must complete a real recursion.
Every resolver is queried in the same instant each round, so a momentary network stall lands on all of them equally instead of penalising whichever happened to go first.
Rounds are spread across roughly ten seconds rather than fired in a burst, so the result samples a window of time instead of one instant — and is less likely to trip rate limiting.
A resolver that returned too few answers is excluded from ranking rather than ranked on a lucky sample.
Ad and tracker blocking was verified by probe. Malware and adult-content claims are what the operator states, and are labelled separately — this tool does not audit blocklists.

What it cannot see

Only resolvers whose DoH endpoint permits cross-origin requests can be measured at all. AdGuard, OpenDNS, Mullvad and NextDNS answer normally but send no CORS header, so a browser cannot read their responses and they cannot appear here.
The resolver your own machine uses frequently cannot be measured — browsers withhold that timing in many privacy configurations and for connections that were already open. When that happens the result says so rather than estimating.
Nothing inside your building is visible. Wi-Fi signal, switches, and cabling all sit past where a browser can see, and they cause far more everyday slowness than DNS does.
No ICMP ping, jitter, or packet loss. Browsers cannot send ICMP at all, and the honest alternative needs a dedicated endpoint that is not deployed yet.
One measurement, from one browser, at one moment. Response times shift with location, time of day, and the network you are on — re-run it a few times before drawing conclusions.

DNS Speed TestIs your DNSslowing you down?

Reading a DNS speed test — what each number means

Cached vs first-time — the gap is the interesting part

Median, not average

95th percentile — the slow tail

Variation between queries

Success rate, shown as 12/12

Twelve hostnames, not one

DNS speed test methodology, and what it cannot see

How it measures

What it cannot see

DNS Speed TestIs your DNSslowing you down?

Reading a DNS speed test — what each number means

Cached vs first-time — the gap is the interesting part

Median, not average

95th percentile — the slow tail

Variation between queries

Success rate, shown as 12/12

Twelve hostnames, not one

DNS speed test methodology, and what it cannot see

How it measures

What it cannot see

DNS Speed TestIs your DNS
slowing you down?

DNS Speed TestIs your DNS
slowing you down?