iPerf2 vs PingPlotter
iPerf2
iperf2.sourceforge.io
PingPlotter
pingplotter.comSide by side
| Figure | iPerf2 | PingPlotter |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $6.99/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | Yes | Yes |
| Android | Yes | — |
| API | — | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 3 | 6 |
| Spec score · Network Testing Software | 8.8 (#1) | 8.8 (#2) |
| Licence | The core iperf2 source is distributed under the BSD 3-Clause licence, with some ancillary files using other open-source licences. | The desktop licence agreement restricts reproduction, publication, transmission and translation, indicating proprietary commercial software. |
| Rating on Apple App Store | 3.5 out of 5 from 6 reviews | 3.4 out of 5 from 36 ratings. |
| Support | The project provides ticket and discussion pages on SourceForge. | PingPlotter directs users to its support team for help with downloads, licenses, and product questions. |
| What it does | Iperf 2 generates and receives TCP or UDP traffic between client and server instances to measure network throughput, latency, jitter, packet loss and related metrics. | PingPlotter traces routes to network targets and continuously graphs latency and packet loss to help locate connection problems. |
Plans
iPerf2
- Community editionFree
- Iperf 2 open-source editionFree
- Professional editionFree
PingPlotter
- FreeFree
- Standard$6.99 a month
- Professional$29 a month
- Professional Edition$29 a month
- PingPlotter Cloud$90 a month
- Standard EditionPrice not published
In their own words
iPerf2
iPerf2 measures network traffic performance, including throughput, latency, link capacity, and responsiveness. Testing uses a client to send traffic to a server. It can generate TCP and UDP traffic in one-way, bidirectional, full-duplex, and simultaneous multi-stream configurations. Measurements include one-way delay, round-trip time, jitter, packet loss, and throughput. It supports IPv4, IPv6, and multicast, including source-specific multicast joins, and reports can include enhanced metrics or use CSV format. The project manual describes an Android client with live meters for throughput, latency, and congestion signals. The manual also describes permit-key HMAC authentication using a timestamped HMAC-SHA256 value, with replay limited by a configurable time window. Its Professional feature set includes server access gating and remotely enabled server-side latency histograms. Measurements happen at socket-level reads and writes, so lower-level protocol-header overhead is excluded. iPerf2 and iPerf3 are separate implementations and do not interoperate. It runs on Android, Linux, macOS, and Windows, and can be self-hosted. Both listed editions are free.
PingPlotter
PingPlotter monitors network performance and maps network paths to help locate connection problems. It tracks latency, jitter and packet loss, with desktop editions monitoring connections from one Windows or macOS computer. PingPlotter Cloud adds an online dashboard for remote connections, while Insights analyzes network data for incidents, possible causes and fixes. Cloud alert actions can make REST calls to services including Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat and JIRA. Webhooks can report agent status or connection-quality changes and link to compatible apps through services such as Zapier and Power Automate. Desktop editions have a 14-day trial; afterward, the free version allows one connection, no remote collection and 10 minutes of monitoring history. Cloud trials last seven days. The free plan is free. Standard Edition starts at $6.99/mo.; Professional Edition is $29 a month, and PingPlotter Cloud is $90 a month. Platforms listed include Windows, macOS, Linux, web and iOS.