I have RCN internet in Chicago. I've attached a picture of the ping plotter trace route to the Columbus Ohio Fortnite server as this is the closest server to Chicago. It seems RCN is routing the traffic all the way to their Pennsylvania data center (207.172.19.166) and then back towards Ohio. This is when the ping jumps from 8 seconds to 44 seconds. Wouldn't it make more sense from a ping perspective to route straight from Chicago data center to Ohio? This makes it impossible for me to get low ping. Even if Fortnite came out with a Central North American server I would still have to travel to the east coast and back. I actually get better ping to the Virgina Fortnite server than I do the Ohio one by about 10 ms. Is this something most ISPs do? Is the only way to fix this to change to an ISP headquartered in the mid west? I've always been told choose the server closest to you for the best ping but because this ISP routes all the way to their headquarters before attempting to reach the destination that theory is not true.

[img]https://share.pingplotter.com/2HriGRirA6z[/img]

Thanks,


Bryan

Hey Bryan!

Hmm - well the biggest thing I see here is that you still have a good round-trip time - ~40ms is a pretty good time, if you ask me! Playing Overwatch, I usually am somewhere in the 90ms range (sigh). However, if you're not satisfied with this and do want to try to change this route, you do have a few options:

1. Use a VPN. VPNs can change your route, and sometimes give you a shorter one.
2. Call your ISP and see if they can change the route. They *may* be able to help you out.
3. Switch to a different ISP. Someone else might not direct you all the way to Timbuktu.

Let us know if you have any other questions with PingPlotter!

Thanks Hayla. VPN did improve my ping by about 5-10 ms and has been more stable so far. I believe my ISP (RCN) has some serious routing issues and this VPN taking a new routing path has definitely helped.

Thanks again,

Bryan