Is it me or youtube being slow at times?

[Xtra7973]

Well this has been going on so long with me I dont even know how long its been now. I tired everything from blocking ip ranges., to changing my DNS, which worked for a while. The only thing that works anymore is using a proxy. How this is not fixed yet is beyond me. What recourse do we have besides taking our money elsewhere? Thats the point im at with it anymore. I am just posting this to maybe help someone else out, as im looking at other alternatives. I dont like comcast at all, I hate them to be honest, but id rather give them my money for something im paying for that I know works as my neighbor dont have this problem at all. Here are two tracerts I just ran back to back

Tracing route to youtube.com [74.125.226.231]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 
2 26 ms 25 ms 25 
3 27 ms 26 ms 27 ms G0-10-0-2.PHLAPA-LCR-22.verizon-gni.net [130.81.
195.142]
4 26 ms 25 ms 26 ms ae6-0.PHIL-BB-RTR2.verizon-gni.net [130.81.199.2
10]
5 32 ms 32 ms 38 ms 0.xe-4-1-3.XL4.IAD8.ALTER.NET [152.63.3.249]
6 36 ms 35 ms 35 ms TenGigE0-7-2-0.GW7.IAD8.ALTER.NET [152.63.37.94]

7 * * * Request timed out.
8 * * 33 ms 216.239.46.248
9 33 ms 33 ms 33 ms 72.14.236.148
10 128 ms 133 ms 150 ms 209.85.249.10
11 34 ms 35 ms 36 ms 72.14.236.207
12 35 ms 34 ms 36 ms 72.14.239.252
13 35 ms 35 ms 35 ms lga15s29-in-f7.1e100.net [74.125.226.231]

Trace complete.

Tracing route to youtube.com [74.125.226.231]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 
2 26 ms 26 ms 25 
3 28 ms 26 ms 26 ms G0-10-0-2.PHLAPA-LCR-22.verizon-gni.net [130.81.
195.142]
4 26 ms 26 ms 26 ms ae6-0.PHIL-BB-RTR2.verizon-gni.net [130.81.199.2
10]
5 32 ms 31 ms 32 ms 0.xe-4-1-3.XL4.IAD8.ALTER.NET [152.63.3.249]
6 36 ms 34 ms 35 ms TenGigE0-7-1-0.GW7.IAD8.ALTER.NET [152.63.32.202
]
7 109 ms * 107 ms google-gw.customer.alter.net [152.179.50.106]
8 33 ms 33 ms 33 ms 216.239.46.248
9 37 ms 34 ms 33 ms 72.14.236.148
10 35 ms 35 ms 35 ms 209.85.249.10
11 34 ms 40 ms 34 ms 72.14.236.207
12 35 ms 37 ms 35 ms 72.14.239.252
13 35 ms 34 ms 35 ms lga15s29-in-f7.1e100.net [74.125.226.231]

Trace complete.

[Swords1]

> Do you expect Verizon to open an unlimited bandwith pipe just so their millions of customers can stream YouTube. Yea > perhaps YouTube needs to work out their routing and connection issues with Verizon, and I can be sure it is a money
> issue.

Actually, I absolutely expect that! We are paying Verizon our bandwith fees exactly for this purpose.

it isn't Google or Youtube or whatever "creating" traffic, it is us, Verizon customers, requesting this traffic to be sent to us

and it is for this that we pay Verizon its FiOS fees.

Or you think we are paying FiOS to just to say we have internet but not actually be able to access anything?

At this point I am considering if Verizon is violating its terms of service.

[pj_rage]

Same problem here in the DC metro area.  It is unbelievably bad almost every night (never try at other times of day).  And I pay a premium for 150/65, their top service offered to me.  I upgraded to the 150/65 from 50/35 or something like that (also with FIOS).  I've had the faster service for more than a few months now, and youtube was bad before the upgrade, and stayed equally bad after, though I do peg the 150/65 for anything but youtube.  In other words, upgrading to their fastest service did not make youtube one iota faster.

I can sit on some videos in 240p for hours and they won't play.  Literally.  Refresh the page a few times, doesn't help.  Let it sit overnight to buffer, doesn't help.  Quite simply, some nights you just aren't going to watch certain videos (unless you watch them without FIOS).  And as a general rule of thumb, forget about HD.  On average, I'm LUCKY if I can watch 240p for a few seconds at a time with it stopping to buffer for a split second every few seconds.  On the other hand, maybe 1 out of 10 videos actually will play in HD without any issues.  It's a total crapshoot, but the odds are against you that you'll even be able to watch what you want.

It's been this way for the past couple months, but has gotten much worse lately.  Even though it has been really bad for the past 4 or 5 months at least, I did notice that suddenly last week or the week before, for a full week, it was perfect.  I could stream any video at any resolution without any issues.  Thought it was fixed!!  Then, suddenly it's worse than ever.  I've tried all the tricks to no avail (the firewall tricks to use backup servers, etc), and nothing helps at all.  The problem exists on all of my computers and on my phone and tablet when they are connected to the FIOS wifi.  However, if I let my phone use its cellular network, the same videos which FIOS will not play actually play perfectly with no buffering issues whatsoever even in HD.  At a friend's house who has comcast, I was able to play anything I wanted with zero issues whatsoever.  I don't know if I was just lucky that night or what, but it was way better than what I get nightly with fios on youtube.

The only saving grace is proxfree.  With it, all youtube videos work perfectly.  I can instantly, and without any buffering problems at all, play 1080p video all day long, any video, any time, no problems.  Never ever gives an issue even when the video will not buffer after an hour on the regular youtube site.  This leads me to believe that the problem lies with Verizon.  Other ISPs can play the same videos without any issues, including my phone (AT&T) which NEVER has a youtube problem on the cell network even with HD, and comcast (per the one time I tried and per my friend mentioning that he doesn't experience issues).  And then proxfree allows even FIOS to work perfectly.  My understanding of what proxfree is doing is making it look to FIOS like you are not using youtube, but instead using just general http traffic (which I never ever have an issue with normal http traffic on FIOS).  This seems to prove to me that when Verizon sees you trying to watch a youtube video, they purposely limit/throttle the connection to the point of not being able to do anything.  I suppose it could be youtube itself noticing that you are on FIOS and limiting/throttle just FIOS users... but that seems a little harder to believe for me.  In any case, it is very clear to me that when Verizon knows you are watching youtube, the connection speed to youtube (just to youtube) is throttled by A LOT.  When they do not know you are watching youtube, you get full unrestricted speed to youtube.  This seems to prove to me that they are throttling it, and IMO it is not right.

In any case, this is simply ridiculous.  I'm paying a premium for the top service offered, and one of the core things I like to use the internet for does not work because Verizon has decided that it won't work.  Thank God for proxfree for the time being anyway so at least I can watch some videos -- but it doesn't make it right for them to do what they are doing.  I would call and complain but I know I'll get some idiot following a checklist and eventually blaming youtube or my computer.  It sucks, because I love the speeds for all other sites, and I am very happy with their cable TV, but this problem is getting more annoying by the day to the point of considering my other options.

I really hope they are able to fix this soon.

[andrewjs18]

It seems like this might be an issue where when you go to youtube.com, it redirects you to a cdn that youtube is using and that cdn happens to be saturated with traffic, thus the slow load times.

[Mayimbe007]

It's definitely an issue.  It's not only youtube but also when downloading for the Google Play Store.  My short term fix is to vpn into my jobs network.  Doing this allows me to stream without issue.  I just wish Verizon would fess up and admit it is an issue and take steps to address it.

[EarthRocker]

Hey, I just want to say I have the exact same issue, and it seems have gotten worse over the past 2 weeks.  I love Youtube and I watch it all the time, but lately it's been so unreliable that I have stopped.  Other video sites load fine, like Break.com, Justin.TV, Twitch, Vimeo, Daily Cafe, but Youtube will barely load a video at 144p.  It's funny because when I lived in Worcester, I did not have issues at all and I was on Charter.

So tonight was the final straw.  I tried to watch some Youtube and nothing was loading, even at 144p.  I called Verizon and had to sift through the typical automated **bleep**, and finally when I get connected to a live representive, he basically told me I was a liar.  He even interrupted me telling me I was wrong when I was trying to explain in much detail as possible.  I tried to be as level headed and calm with this guy as possible, explaining that I had the Youtube speed tests showing me that the results were the slowest out of all the results.  I also pointed him the fact that this seems to be a widespread issue as this forum, and many others point out exact same problems I have. 

The representitive came at me in a typical corporate drone response, saying as he was sorry but it could never EVER be verizon's fault, how I should contact Youtube technical support.  Then to make things worse he asked me to read him the results of the speed tests(15/5) and because I got 24/5 that I was over the capacity I paid for so I shouldn't be having problems in the first place.  What, what does that have to do with anything I am calling about?  To top if off he refused to help me in any way, and came off in a very condescending manner.  I basically wasted 45 minutes just to be blown off by some jerk in a red shirt with a crappy headset. 

Verizon, what am I paying over a hundred dollars a month for if I can't even use the most popular video site in the world?  I know you guys are either throttling youtube or there is seriously something broken on your part.  I know that I will not be renewing my contract come October.  For your so called fiber optic light speed connections, I have experienced way too many issues, from extremely slow speeds(this happens way too often) to very rude, unhelpful tech support that to even speak to, I gotta sit through your **bleep** automated system.   It's not worth the money or hassle, and will switch to another ISP when my contract expires in October. 

[smuggle]

I think I am having the same problem, youtube is totally unusable and I do mean totally, downloads, watching videos, 360p 480p 720p 1080p any of them... and sometimes its fine and 1080p is no problem! when are these sometimes? well it's basically every afternoon/evening/late evening i cannot use youtube, if i'm ever up in the middle of the night or early morning it works great! so whoever or whatever is throttling me is only doing during SANE usage hours... meaning when no one is using youtube it works great.... a year ago I had comcast and didn't have this issue, seriously considering switching back, but when it is working verizon is all around better service, which has been faster and more reliable for me, and comcast has done some truly awful things to me, like coming to my apartment and unhooking my internet for no reason, then when i called claiming it hadn't happened...so.... it's inability to use the main function of my internet...sometimes... versus horrible track record and also might not work... heck... maybe i should pay for a month of both at the same time just to test the issue and prove if it's happening on both or not? (no other providers exist in my area)..

if I call in the middle of the night on the weekend verizon tech support at least answers, comcast support used to just be closed when not during business hours... crazy.

[dudeondacouch]

Everyone (that I know of) is having the same problem.  There are thread here, reddit, and dozens of other sites, yet Verizon refuses to acknowledge the issue either here OR via customer service.

All I can get out of them is "Well, if it's only Youtube, it must be their fault."

It's a chickensh1t copout, and anyone who works for them **bleep** well better admit it.

I'm in the process of changing ISPs because of this one issue, and the failure of Verizon to take action or even admit to a single user that there is a problem.

[Namronorman]

Best of luck, I'm attempting to do so as well. They're wanting to charge me an ETF of $160 to cancel their terrible service. I've complained to the BBB and PA attorney general. If that doesn't work, I'll just file suit in smail claims, it's cheaper than the ETF...

[Economonster]

I just started my Verizon service about a week ago and have noticed near-constant problems with Youtube as well.  I can pretty consistenly realize 56/33 mbps on Verizon AND independent speed tests, though, and every other service runs like lightning.

I've tried several solutions to try and fix the problem of bad hops to Youtube and none of them have worked.  From an online chat I just had with a Verizon tech (who was super nice and knowledgeable, btw):

[[Edit: Oops, I didn't know we couldn't post portions of the chat log.  Basically, the tech told me straight up that the connection between Verizon and Google is at capacity, and we're at the mercy of the two companies working out a bigger back-end pipeline for Google services.]]

This was after we ran a tracert to 206.46.230.37 and the hops started timing out at the IP 206.46.228.129.  I've tried blocking the following IP ranges in the router firewall: 173.194.55.0/255, 206.111.0.0/255, 173.194.7.0/255.  These haven't worked for me though, and neither has switching to Google's Public DNS instead of having Verizon load me onto one automatically.  Some people have had success with those methods, so I thought I'd give them a try.

Basically, it seems that the only thing that we can do as consumers is make a big stink about it to Verizon and Google in the hopes that they work out the bandwidth issues. 😕