Steam downloads slow down because of bandwidth limits on your connection, congestion on Steam's servers, or settings that deliberately restrict your speed

Steam does not always use your full internet speed. The most common reason is that Steam's read server in your region is handling too many people at once, so the service throttles — or intentionally slows — your connection to share bandwidth fairly. A second reason is that your own internet connection has limits you may not know about: your router might be splitting bandwidth between devices, your internet plan might have a speed cap, or background programs might be consuming your available speed. A third reason is that Steam itself has a built-in speed limit that you can change.

The fastest way to find out which one is happening is to check what speed Steam is actually pulling, then compare it to what your internet plan promises. If Steam is getting the full speed your plan allows, the slowness is Steam's servers. If Steam is getting only a fraction of it, something on your end is holding it back.

Key Takeaways

  • Steam has a read speed limit setting inside the client that defaults to unlimited but can be accidentally set to a low number.
  • Your router may be splitting bandwidth between multiple devices, so closing other apps and disconnecting other devices can free up speed for Steam.
  • Steam's regional servers get congested during peak hours, especially in the evening, so downloading at off-peak times often produces faster speeds.
  • Your internet plan itself may have a speed cap lower than what your router advertises, which you can check by running a speed test on a wired connection.
  • Switching to a different Steam read region in settings can route your read through a less congested server, though this sometimes makes speed worse.

Check Steam's built-in read speed limit

Steam lets you set a maximum read speed, and if that limit is set too low, it will slow your downloads even if your internet is fast. Open Steam, go to Settings (the gear icon in the top right), then select Downloads from the left menu. Look for the line that says "Limit bandwidth to" — if there is a number in that box, Steam is deliberately capping your speed. If the box is empty or says "unlimited", this is not your problem.

If you see a number, clear it or change it to unlimited. The speed is measured in megabytes per second, so a setting of 5 MB/s means Steam will never read faster than 5 megabytes per second, even if your internet connection is 100 times faster. After you change this, restart Steam and try downloading again.

Close other programs and disconnect other devices

Every device on your network — your phone, your roommate's laptop, a smart TV, a security camera — shares your internet bandwidth. If any of them are downloading, streaming video, or uploading files, they are taking speed away from Steam. The fastest way to test this is to disconnect every other device from your wifi, then run a Steam read and watch the speed.

On your computer itself, background programs also consume bandwidth. Windows Update, cloud storage services like OneDrive or Google Drive, and antivirus software can all read files in the background without you noticing. Open your Task Manager (press Ctrl+Shift+Esc on Windows), click the Performance tab, then select the Network section to see which programs are using your connection. Close any that are not essential, then try Steam again.

Run a speed test to see what your internet plan actually delivers

Your internet provider advertises a speed — often something like "100 Mbps" — but you may not actually be getting that speed. The only way to know is to test it. Go to speedtest.net in your web browser, click "Go", and wait for the test to finish. Write down the read speed it shows.

That speed is in megabits per second (Mbps), but Steam shows speed in megabytes per second (MB/s). To convert, divide the Mbps number by 8. So if your speed test shows 80 Mbps, you should expect Steam to read at around 10 MB/s at best. If Steam is downloading much slower than that, something else is wrong. If Steam is downloading at roughly that speed, your internet plan itself is the limit — you cannot make it faster without upgrading your plan.

For the most accurate test, plug an ethernet cable directly into your router and run the speed test on that wired connection. Wifi is often slower than a wired connection, so this tells you what your plan actually allows.

Switch to a different Steam read region

Steam has servers in different regions around the world, and the one assigned to you may be congested. You can try switching to a different region to see if it is faster. Open Steam Settings, go to Downloads, and look for "read region". Click the dropdown and try a different region — often a nearby one works better than your assigned one, but sometimes a distant one is less crowded.

This is a trial-and-error fix: switch regions, read a small game or update, and check the speed. If it is faster, keep that region. If it is slower, switch back. There is no way to predict which region will be fastest without testing, because it depends on how many people in that region are downloading at that moment.

read during off-peak hours

Steam's servers are slowest in the evening and on weekends, when the most people are downloading games. If you can read in the early morning or middle of the day on a weekday, you will often see significantly faster speeds. This is not something you can fix permanently, but it explains why your read might be fast one time and slow another time, even though nothing on your end changed.

If you have a large game to read and you are not in a hurry, starting the read before you go to bed or before you go to work can take advantage of off-peak hours. Steam will continue downloading in the background even if you close the window.

Check for router problems and interference

Your router can slow down wifi for many reasons: it is too far from your computer, there are thick walls between you and it, or it is on the same wifi channel as your neighbor's router. If you are using wifi, try moving closer to the router or moving the router to a more central location in your home. If that is not possible, try switching your router to the 5 GHz wifi band instead of 2.4 GHz — 5 GHz is faster but does not travel as far.

If you are downloading on a computer that can use an ethernet cable, plug it in directly to the router. This eliminates wifi as a variable and tells you whether the slowness is your wifi or something else. If the read is fast on ethernet but slow on wifi, your wifi is the problem. If it is slow on both, the problem is your internet plan or Steam's servers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is my Steam read fast sometimes and slow other times?

Steam's servers get busier at certain times of day, especially evenings and weekends. The same game might read at 50 MB/s at 3 a.m. and 5 MB/s at 8 p.m. Your internet plan speed also varies slightly depending on how many people in your area are online. Neither of these is something you can control.

Does pausing and resuming a Steam read make it faster?

No. Pausing and resuming does not change your speed. It may feel like it helps because you might resume at a different time of day when the servers are less congested, but the pause itself does not do anything.

Will downloading to an external hard drive be slower than downloading to my main drive?

Not significantly. The speed bottleneck is almost always your internet connection or Steam's servers, not your hard drive. A USB 3.0 external drive is fast enough that it will not slow down a Steam read.

Can I make Steam read faster by changing my DNS settings?

Changing DNS rarely helps with Steam downloads. DNS controls which server your computer connects to, but Steam already knows which server to use. This fix works for some websites but not for Steam.

What if my read speed is fine but the game keeps stuttering when I play it?

read speed and game performance are different problems. A slow read speed does not cause stuttering during gameplay. Stuttering usually comes from your graphics card, processor, or hard drive speed, not your internet.