Softonic

Data Transfer Rate Converter

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Type a bandwidth figure, pick its unit, get the equivalent in every other common rate, in bits and bytes. Use it to translate the 940 Mbps on your fibre plan into the MB/s your download manager actually reports, size an AWS NAT gateway in MB/s, or compare two quoted numbers that use different units.

How to convert transfer rates

  1. 1

    Enter a rate

    Any positive number. Decimals welcome: 2.5 Gbps is a valid input.

  2. 2

    Pick the source unit

    bps, Kbps, Mbps, Gbps, Tbps for bits per second, or B/s, KB/s, MB/s, GB/s for bytes per second.

  3. 3

    Pick the target unit

    The converter covers the standard SI units from bps to Tbps and from B/s to GB/s, all on the ×1000 scale. 1024-based (IEC) units such as MiB/s are not included.

  4. 4

    Read the result

    You get a direct equivalence in the unit you chose. For example, 100 Mbps converts to 12.5 MB/s, the figure a download manager typically reports.

Bits, bytes and why ISPs quote in bits

ISPs and networking vendors quote throughput in bits (Mbps, Gbps). File managers and OS transfer dialogs quote in bytes (MB/s, MiB/s). The conversion is simple: divide bits by 8.

  • 100 Mbps = 12.5 MB/s theoretical, ~11.2 MiB/s after 1024-based rounding, ~10–11 MiB/s practical.
  • 1 Gbps = 125 MB/s theoretical, ~119.2 MiB/s, ~110–118 MiB/s in the real world on wired gigabit.
  • 10 Gbps = 1.25 GB/s theoretical.

Reference throughputs

Rate Feels like
1 Mbps Audio streaming, basic web
5 Mbps Standard-definition video
15–25 Mbps Single 1080p Netflix stream
50 Mbps Solid 4K stream, small family
100 Mbps Modern household fibre floor
300–500 Mbps Typical fibre mid-tier
1 Gbps Fibre top tier, small office
2.5–10 Gbps Prosumer, data centre, SAN
40–400 Gbps Backbone, hyperscaler east-west

Theoretical vs. usable

Real throughput is always lower than the headline rate. Causes include:

  • Protocol overhead. TCP/IP adds ~3–5% on top of Ethernet.
  • Handshake and TLS. New connections cost a round-trip or two.
  • Contention. Shared medium (Wi-Fi, cable) splits bandwidth among users.
  • Server side. The source may be slower than your link.
  • Distance and RTT. High latency caps single-TCP-stream throughput.

A useful rule: plan on 80–90% of the quoted rate on wired links, 40–70% on Wi-Fi depending on signal.

MiB/s vs MB/s

Operating systems differ. macOS and Linux tend to show MB/s using the decimal definition. Windows often shows MB/s but uses 1024-based maths (so it is really MiB/s). When comparing reported throughput across machines, know which scheme each one uses, a 10% difference on screen can be the same real number.

Frequently Asked Questions

Yes. 1 Gbps is 125 MB/s in theory, but TCP/IP and Ethernet overhead plus any wire loss usually bring wired real-world transfers down to 105–118 MB/s. That is not a fault; it is the normal yield of the link.

Providers bill volume moved, not peak rate. A 1 Gbps link running flat for one hour moves 450 GB, which is what the bill is counted against. Peak bandwidth is only relevant for link sizing, not pricing.

Lowercase “b” means bits, uppercase “B” means bytes. 100 Kbps is 12.5 kB/s. Case matters for bandwidth, even though casual writing often ignores it.

A 2x2 Wi-Fi 6 client on a 160 MHz channel can hit ~1.2 Gbps on paper. Real-world throughput with a good signal and no interference is usually 500–900 Mbps; congested networks drop into the low hundreds.

The value you enter is sent to our servers to compute the result as part of the page interaction, and it briefly appears in the page link while you move through the tool’s steps. It is not stored, logged or shared with anyone. Only anonymous usage statistics are collected.

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