As the demand for faster speeds has grown rapidly over recent decades, new communications networking equipment and systems are constantly being developed to accommodate these requirements. One result of these efforts is a series of established networking protocols and terminology that are used to identify various speed thresholds and the related equipment.
The comparison chart below is intended as a quick reference guide to help readers associate the various networking speeds with their respective protocol/service names.
Network Communication Speed Comparison Chart
|
Max Throughput Speed |
Protocol / Service |
|
64 kbps |
DSO / Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) |
|
1.5 Mbps |
DS1 / T1 |
|
10 Mbps |
10Base-T Ethernet / RS-422 |
|
45 Mbps |
DS3 / T3 |
|
100 Mbps |
100Base-T Ethernet (Fast Ethernet) / FDDI |
|
155 Mbps |
OC-3 / STM-1 Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) / Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) |
|
200 Mbps |
ESCON (Enterprise Systems Connectivity) |
|
622 Mbps |
OC-12 / STM-4 |
|
1 Gbps |
Gigabit Ethernet and Fibre Channel |
|
2 Gbps |
Fibre Channel |
|
2.5 Gbps |
OC-48 / STM-16 / OTU1 (Optical Transport Unit) |
|
4/8 Gbps |
Fibre Channel / Infiniband |
|
10 Gbps |
10G Ethernet / OC-192 / STM-64 / OTU2 / Fibre Channel (Serial and Parallel) |
|
16 Gbps |
Fibre Channel / Infiniband |
|
40/43 Gbps |
OC-768 / OTU3 |
|
100/112 Gbps |
100GE / OTU4 |
|
Various |
Video and proprietary protocols |
|
> 1 Tbps |
Wavelength Division Multiplex |
Chart courtesy of ONPATH Technologies
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