Rise Broadband speed test

Rise Broadband is an excellent fixed wireless internet provider that offers speeds as fast (or faster) than many satellite providers, along with much more usable data limits—including an unlimited data option. This makes it much more convenient for users that need a lot of data.

The downside is that Rise Broadband lacks the super-wide availability of most satellite internet. You also need a clear line of sight to the towers broadcasting the signal. However, the price and convenience can make it an excellent alternative for rural customers.

Download speed: This measures how quickly data travels from the server to your device. Download speed determines the speed of loading webpages and downloading files, as well as the quality of streaming media, like Netflix and Hulu.

Upload speed: Upload speed is how fast data travels from your device to the server. It’s used to upload photos and videos to social media, send emails, and handle other outgoing tasks. It can also have an impact on video calls, like Zoom.

Latency: Latency measures how long it takes data to travel from your computer to the server and back. Lower latency is better. The farther you are from the tower or server, the more latency you’ll have. It’s particularly important for online gaming, where reaction time for every button press is critical.

Ping: Ping is often used as a synonym for latency, but it’s actually slightly different. A ping is the piece of data used to measure latency.

If you run your speed test and find that your connection is, in fact, too slow for your needs, don’t worry. Rise Broadband offers several speed tiers, up to 50 Mbps with the fixed broadband service. Check the Rise Broadband internet plans table for details.

There are two basic fixed wireless plans available: 50 Mbps and 200 Mbps. These come with 250 GB of data by default, and you can then upgrade them to unlimited data for an additional $20 per month.

Rise Broadband is also building out a fiber network with speeds up to 1 Gbps, but it’s far less available than the fixed wireless service, at least at this time.¹ It’s also not really competitive with satellite internet the way that fixed wireless is, which is why we’ve left it out of the discussion. Be sure to check with your Rise Broadband representative to see if it's available in your area or if there are plans to bring it there in the future.

You can use our Rise Broadband speed test tool to check your Rise Broadband speed. Simply connect to your Rise Broadband internet, scroll up to the top of this page, and click Start Speed Test. The results will show you your download speed, upload speed, and latency. That’s all there is to it!

Rise Broadband offers speeds starting at 50 Mbps. This is likely to be sufficient for most basic uses—email, web browsing, occasional video calls, or light streaming. If you do a lot of streaming or video chatting in HD or 4K, however, you may see better performance with speeds of 200 Mbps or higher.

According to 1,357 of our proprietary speed tests, Rise Broadband’s average speed is 20.85 Mbps. This is significantly faster than the average speeds of satellite internet providers like Viasat and Hughesnet, although it falls short of Starlink.²

That 50 Mbps speed should be plenty for most users to handle all their day-to-day tasks, and you won’t need to worry about your next streaming marathon with the higher data caps Rise Broadband offers.

There are a few reasons your Rise Broadband internet might be slow:

• The network is congested as a result of a large number of simultaneous users in the area.
• Several people are using your connection to stream or download large files simultaneously.
• The network is experiencing signal interference of some sort.
• You’re too far away from your wireless router.

You can try sitting closer to your router, closing out background processes that might be using up bandwidth, or asking your family or roommates to stop streaming. If you experience the slowness regularly at the same time, you may be running into peak traffic hours for your area—consider shifting your use to a different time, if possible. 

If you find you’re getting less than the speed you’re paying for, there are a few potential fixes:

1. Ensure there are no background processes running on your devices that could be using bandwidth.
2. Run a virus scan on your computer to check for malware that might be sending out a malicious signal.
3. Check your router for any connection issues.
4. Make sure you’re close enough to your router. If you have a particularly large home, you might be exceeding its range.

If you’re only running into internet issues when streaming, check out our How to Stop Buffering guide for more specific tips. If you just can’t get your Rise Broadband service to perform the way you need, you can also look into alternative fixed wireless or satellite providers, like HughesNet, Viasat, or Starlink.

Compared to the satellite competition, Rise Broadband is much more affordable and offers more data than anyone but Starlink. Starlink is likely better if you need faster speeds, but you’ll pay for it in monthly cost and potentially some reliability issues.

When you take our Rise Broadband speed test, a file is sent from the server to your computer, and then back again. The test can determine your download speed, upload speed, and latency by timing how long the process takes.

Keep in mind, your internet speed usually varies throughout the day. During periods of congestion (high internet traffic, usually in the evening, when lots of people in your area are online) your connection speed might slow. Meanwhile, in the morning when there aren’t so many other users online, it could be faster.

To get an accurate average speed for your Rise Broadband internet connection, we suggest taking the speed test multiple times over the course of a day.

1. Rise Broadband, Rise Fiber. Accessed November 16, 2022.
2. Isla McKetta, Ookla, “How Starlink’s Satellite Internet Stacks Up Against HughesNet and Viasat around the Globe.” August 2021. Accessed November 16, 2022.