When playing a game on Xbox LIVE, you experience lag

• Slow gameplay
• Poor performance or "lag" between actions

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1. Check your bandwidth. You may have reached the capacity of your high-speed connection. If you share your high-speed connection with other networking devices, such as a computer, stop using the other devices when you play a game on Xbox LIVE. For example, if another person is downloading files or is surfing the Internet on a computer that is part of the same network as the Xbox console, you may experience lag when you use Xbox LIVE at the same time.
   
   You may also want to contact your Internet service provider (ISP) to determine whether they are experiencing any network issues.
   Note Your ISP may have a service status Web page that you can easily find and visit.
2. Play at a different time. Typically, residential high-speed Internet networks are busiest in the evenings when people are at home using their computers. If you find that you are in this situation, you may want to discuss the issue with your ISP.
3. Reduce the number of players. If you host games and other players complain about lag, reduce the maximum number of players that can join your game. For example, reduce the number of players who can join your game from 16 to 8.
   Note The upload speed determines how efficiently you can host games. The faster the upload speed, the more players that you can host. Sometimes, other hosts may not consider their upload bandwidth. Therefore, you may experience lag when you join other players’ games if their upload speed is low or if they let too many players join the game.
4. Check your wireless connection. If you use a wireless connection to connect to Xbox LIVE, instead try a wired connection. If you do not experience lag with a wired connection, your wireless connection may be experiencing poor signal strength or interference from other devices. To check the strength of your wireless signal from the dashboard, follow these steps:
   1. Go to My Xbox.
   2. Select System Settings.
   3. Select Network Settings.
   4. Select Test Xbox Live connection, and then view the signal strength that is indicated by the connection test.
5. For satellite connections: If you use a satellite dish for your broadband connection, you may experience slow performance when you try to join or play a game, even if the connection appears to generally work fine with Xbox LIVE. This is issue occurs because of the way that satellite connections handle latency.

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Additional support

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