Troubleshooting and hopefully fixing your rubberbanding/network lag in CS:GO (Windows)

All games will use the same approach as I will point out here, not just CS:GO, but to find the IP's you need you have to use google and figure out what the game you are having issues with uses. This guide was created because I often help people on Reddit with this issue and I though it would be nice to have something to link to instead of writing the same thing every time. This guide will go through some of the most common reasons of why some people are experiencing rubberbanding and/or high ping in CS:GO for no apparent reason and show you how you might fix it.

CS:GO is laggin/rubberbanding, but all other games work fine!

CS:GO might be lagging while other games work fine without it being Valve's fault. Valve's matchmaking and casual servers are 64 tick (Tick is a term for how often your game communicates with the server each second) and private servers might even be 128 tick. Most other games use a maximum of 30 tick servers. In other words CS:GO is over twice (Four times on private servers) as demanding of the stability of your internet connection compared to other games. This means that CS:GO can rubberband and be unplayable while other games work fine. This is however one of the reasons for why CS:GO feels as responsive as it does.

Checking if the problem is on your end, your Internet Provider's or Valve's

The first thing you should do just to be 100% sure it's a problem with your connection, press "Play" in CS:GO and select "Offline with bots". If it's fine here you are in the right place!

This section is mostly for people with high ping, but it can also be useful for people who are rubberbanding even though they have low ping. You will need to have the console enabled for this part. To enable the console, start up CS:GO and press "Options", then select "Game Settings". The fourth line from the top should say "Enable developer console", set this to "Yes". Then hit "Options" again and select "Keyboard / Mouse". At the bottom of this list, you will be able to set a button that will open the console.

Using the windows commandline to check the connection between you and the server.
Some college's internet protection might prevent you from doing this, giving you STARs right away. Using this command, you can see all the servers your connection goes through before it reaches Valve's server.

Connect to one of Valve's official servers. If you use the Play button, to play deathmatch for example, it will always put you on an official Valve server. Open the console, write "status" and hit enter. Copy the server's IP from the list. It is the number underlined in the picture. Do not copy the colon ":" or any of the numbers after the colon.
Now, press the Start button in Windows. In the search field, enter "cmd" and hit enter. In the new window that pops up write "tracert <IP>". Ctrl + V does not work for this window, instead right click and select Paste.

Sorry about the norwegian text in the picture!

Yellow underline: This shows you how to correctly enter the tracert command with the IP.
Blue underline: The underlined number is the ping I had on one of the three ping checks tracert sends to the server. As you can see, this number is abit higher than the others and could be the source of the problem. While 62ms is not that high, it could mean that the server is giving you ping spikes. This can also happen randomly. Repeat the tracert two or three more times to see if it happens again.
Red underline: The "STAR" means that the server did not respond to the request and it can be the source of the problem. In this case the star is at Valve's server (The name ends with valvesoftware.com). If this happens, you should contact Valve's customer support.

If you look a the picture, the last two lines only has STARs. This is because Valve does not allow people to ping their game servers. This is one of their layers of protection to make it slightly more difficult to DDOS their servers or do other exploits. Once this happens, the tracert is complete, but the program will try to reach the server for quite some time so just close it once you have read all the numbers.

The first line of the tracert is your router thats in your house. If you see any stars or high ping here (Some might argue that anything else than <1ms is high) there might be a problem with your router. Try restarting it and if that doesn't work reset it to factory settings.

If your test shows any of the problems I showed you in this section it is most likely a problem with your internet provider. When this happens it usually doesn't last for long. You can call your ISP and notify them that there is a problem and it might speed up the time it takes for them to fix it. Be warned however that most people who work at customer support don't even know what ping is. If you talk to someone who doesn't understand what ping is and what is happening, ask to talk to someone with more technical expertise. Some will argue that the server (or node, if you want to be technical) that is struggling and giving you high ping is not owned by them. This will very often be correct when playing on a server in a different country, but you should point out that they are paying for their traffic to be routed through this server and that they then have to contact the company responsible. Most of the bigger internet providers have a department they can send these reports to who will then handle the rest.

Sadly, there is not anything else to do if you see any of the problems listed in this section. If everything here was normal for you, move to the next section!

If you are using WiFi, this might help you!

This part of the guide will be a little bit different for everyone depending on which router you have. It should not be dificult though as most routers will use the same names for each part of the navigation. This section benefits people who live in an area where there are several other WiFi networks within range the most. First you need to check your signal strength. If it's low/medium the following will probably not help you. If you have a router that has both a 2.4ghz and a 5ghz signal, the 5ghz network is better in every way except for one thing. The 5ghz signal has less range, especially after going through walls. If you use the 5ghz network and have a low/medium signal strength, try using the 2.4ghz network. If you are using the 2.4ghz network, try using the 5ghz network instead. The 5ghz band has alot more channels so the chance of noise is reduced dramatically.

If you live in an area with a very high WiFi density (15+ networks within range), usually the only solution is to get a 5ghz router or use a cabled connection.

Quick explanation of this section
When there are several WiFi networks within the same small area, all the routers will compete about getting their signal through the best. With everyone using the same frequency it will cause noise on your WiFi and can cause you to rubberband with normal ping or just give you high ping. More obscure symptoms is sudden lag when you go around corners or scope with a rifle. To combat this we will change the channel your router sends out your WiFi signals on. This also means that the problem can suddenly happen because your neighbours could have bought a new router that is suddenly creating noise on your WiFi network.

Finding out which channel is the best for you
Depending on the country you live in, your router can send out signals on up to 13 different channels. The best channels to use are channels 1, 6 and 11. The reason for this is that each channel overlaps sligtly with the channels next to it. So if you have 10 neighbours who use channel 6, setting your router to use channel 5 or 7 won't help much because a big part of the signal use the same frequency as channel 6. To find out which channel everyone around is using you can use apps for your phone (iPhone does not allow apps to view this information unless it's jailbroken) or a program for your PC. The PC program is abit less user friendly, but it does the job. If you have an Android phone install WiFi Analyzer[play.google.com]. It will scan your area and find the best channel for you. If you don't have an Android phone, install WiFi Infoview[www.nirsoft.net].

WiFi Infoview

I have boxed the section that shows you which channel people around you are using. Look through all of them and check if channels 1, 6 or 11 are unused. If one or two other people are using one of those channels you can test the least used one and see if the problem is solved. If all of those channels are equally used, you can try using channels 3/4 or 8/9. This part is alot of trial and error.

Changing the channel on your router
The first step is logging in to your router. This is not the same as connecting to your WiFi. Some modern, high end routers require you to go to a website instead of using the IP to get to the login screen. To find out which IP your router is using press and hold the Windows Key and then press R. In the new window type "cmd" and hit enter. In the new window that pops enter "ipconfig" and hit enter. You should now have window that looks like this.
Usually the active network card will be at the top. If it's not, like with me, then scroll down until you find one with similar numbers to the picture.
Red underline: The command used.
Blue underline : This is your router's IP. It will allways be listed as Default Gateway.

Enter the IP you found in the section above in the address bar of your web browser. You should now be greeted by a login screen for your router. Unless you have changed it yourself, on most routers the login name will be "admin". The password will either be blank, "admin", your current WiFi password if you have changed it or your default WiFi password (The default password should be printed on a little sticker on your router). Once you have logged in we want to find the WiFi/Wireless settings. Look for a tab or icon thats named "Network Settings", or something similar, then go to "Wireless" (Again, it might be something similar). You might have "Wireless" right on the first page. Once you have found the WiFi settings page, look for a section called "Channel". In that section put in the channel you found earlier. Apply the changes and try out CS:GO to see if you notice any improvements.

Example of how it looks like on my router (For anyone wondering about me not using a WiFi password, my closest neighbour lives a kilometer (0.6 miles) away)

Other wireless devices close to your router or between your router and WiFi adapter

This section is for the "I have tried everything!" people. It's very rare that this is a problem!
When I say "Other wireless devices", I don't mean phones, printers, TVs, consoles or other things that connect to your WiFi. I'm talking about other things that are wireless on their own like wireless gaming headsets. This is a fairly rare problem and some might even hardly believe it, but these devices can distort the WiFi signal. I have never heard a wireless mouse/keyboard causing this, but the Logitech G930 certainly can cause problems with WiFi (My own G930 would disconnect every 30 minutes until I changed my router's channel. Router was VERY close to the receiver) and some users supposedly canceled their entire wifi by placing the receiver on top of their router. The reason for this is that it uses the 2.4ghz signals, the same as the most common WiFi. Users have reported that placing the receiver too close to the router can cause unstable WiFi. To be safe, place your WiFi receiver between your router and your other wireless receivers. If your router is very close to your PC and it has several wireless peripherals, try moving the router further away.

Contact for additional help

If you need more help or have any questions, post them in this thread on Reddit.

[M`sharp]

thx so much

[JKKM]

ass

[Siamese]

I have this issue and got the stars on few ping, then I change my dns settings to obtain automatically (it was google dns before), then all the problem is gone... maybe the google dns makes the routing more complex? but this works for me! :)

[Suzuki Carry]

sort of helped, thanks!