Apex Legends lag and high ping: causes and fixes

Dying after you reached cover is the classic Apex Legends complaint. Some of it is the game's design and some of it is your connection. Here's which is which, how to pick a data center, and what fixes the part you can fix.

What's the game, and what's you

Apex's servers run at 20 updates a second, as Respawn has explained in its own write-ups on the game's netcode. Between updates, your game shows its best guess, and the server has the final word. So the server can decide you were hit a moment before your screen showed you safe, even on a good connection. That part no setting changes.

Your connection adds to it. Every millisecond of ping, and every update that arrives late or not at all, widens the gap between what you see and what the server decides. That part is yours to shrink.

Pick a data center

On PC, select Data Center at the bottom left of the launch screen, before you press continue. The list shows each data center with your ping and packet loss to it. Pick the one with the lowest ping and no loss. That's usually the closest; if the closest one shows loss, the next one along can play better.

Come back to this list when your games suddenly feel worse. A data center that was fine last week can have a bad route this week.

Find which kind of lag you have

• High ping to every data center: the problem is close to you: your line, your Wi-Fi or your provider.
• Ping that jumps during matches: queueing on the way. What causes ping spikes shows how to find where in ten minutes.
• Packet loss in the data center list or in matches: shots and movement that stutter, the game correcting you.
• Stutter in hot drops with calm network numbers: your frame rate. Windows settings for FPS helps there.

What helps

1. Use a cable. Wi-Fi's jitter and loss are what make fights feel random. Wi-Fi or Ethernet explains.
2. Keep the line quiet: background downloads, uploads and streams on the same connection.
3. Fix the router's queue (SQM, or QoS that's configured) if others share the line.
4. Change the route when your ping to the nearest data center is higher than distance explains, or gets worse every evening.

Where NoSpike fits

NoSpike's Apex Legends entry is a beta: its servers are still being mapped, so NoSpike may not carry all of a match's traffic yet. While you play, Apex's page in the app says what it carries, and on a server NoSpike doesn't route it shows your own ping and says "Match not routed".

Where it does carry the game, it measures your own route and the routes through its relays in Europe, and routes Apex only when a relay is faster. It can shorten the road to the server; it can't change how often the server updates.