In general, the hardware determines the maximum throughput that is available to you. Throttling means that the content provider sees an appropriate reason to limit this speed, but it could be entirely unintentional, too.įinally, the hardware you use can be a factor in how fast or slow your game downloads are. Rather, the speed at which the server is giving you the data is what is going up or down. If you notice a lot of fluctuations, it is probably not something to do with your internet connection. In fact, you can look at the download speeds as you are downloading a Steam game. When this happens, the speed at which you get the files from the server is affected. The content provider has the ability to throttle your connection to its own servers. In this case, the content provider is Steam, and the speed they give you could be intentional or unintentional.
Secondly, t he content provider could be slowing your download speed. If your Steam download is going too slowly, it could be this. If you want to download multiple things, other devices in the home are using the internet, or more than one person is downloading something to different devices, all of that is split between what you’re getting from your provider.įurthermore, activities like gaming on the internet also require bandwidth and the downloading of data, as do video calls and chats. The provider can limit how much download speed you get, but this is usually something that stops at the upper limit of whatever tier you’re paying for, and it will only go below that if you are using a lot of your bandwidth for multiple things at once. Further, we’ll dig deeper into aspects of Steam game downloads, including your computer’s wakefulness, downloading more than one title at once, and the possibility of playing any Steam games without downloading them first. We’ll also address a few troubleshooting methods you might be able to use to mitigate this issue. We will discuss why some games may take longer than others in our article below. Some players who attempt to download titles may wonder why it takes so long to complete the process. It was designed originally to help Valve with updates and other things it needed to get out to players, but it has since expanded to include things like matchmaking for multiplayer servers, DRM support, and social gaming aspects.ĭownloading and enjoying games is still probably Steam’s primary use, however. Although the company develops and publishes its own games, players can find many titles from various corporations hosted on Steam and available for purchase or download. Steam is Valve’s distribution service for many video games.