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Chinese internet is still in the 90s

Been here for almost a month now... The internet is tragically slow... Even loading chinese sites barely works... I'm using China telecom and this is ridiculous. I was in Georgia (europe) a few months ago,and the internet was like 10x faster. I don't understand how a country that's so developed could have slower internet than Georgia .
( 10 comments | 7 points | on HN )
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by LandOfMightDev on Friday June 13, 2025 @05:41AM (#44267081)
Obviously I'm using a proxy to get on this website. But even without proxies it's still so slow.
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by fspeech on Friday June 13, 2025 @11:20AM (#44269345)
If you have a foreign number roaming into China you shouldn't need proxies. Only Chinese numbers go through the great firewall. On the other hand, your speed might depend on your carrier's roaming arrangements.
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by FisherKK on Friday June 13, 2025 @06:38AM (#44267311)
why they can fluently use tiktok?
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by muzani on Friday June 13, 2025 @09:15AM (#44268240)
why they can play pubg?
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by _Broken_Cloud_ on Friday June 13, 2025 @05:41AM (#44267082)
are you connecting over a vpn?
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by snapcaster on Friday June 13, 2025 @08:49AM (#44268038)
I found the same thing when i visited, every single site (chinese or external) was very slow. Every aspect of internet use was much slower. Not something I expected from a country with such advanced technological infrastructure
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by Symbiote on Friday June 13, 2025 @09:25AM (#44268315)
On https://www.speedtest.net/global-index China ranks very highly, very close to here in Denmark.

But https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/internet-... shows it as much slower.

My guess is some sites are allowed without restriction, and others go through filters.

Does https://www.gov.cn/ load quickly? It is very fast from here.

Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by ferguess_k on Friday June 13, 2025 @10:51AM (#44269063)
It shouldn't be the case. Maybe ask around and see what's wrong.
Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by xingped on Friday June 13, 2025 @11:19AM (#44269336)
It is weird and inconsistent and I don't entirely put the blame on Chinese internet. I had the same experience but it seemed to me that problem more so was really badly written apps and services rather than the internet itself. Instead of just taking a little longer to load when loading is slow, apps will simply time out and make you try to load again. So rinse and repeat and nothing ever loads. Additionally apps and mini-apps (i.e. within WeChat/Alipay) seem to completely reload every time you open them rather than caching assets or anything.

So yeah, the experience absolutely sucks, but the problem doesn't seem to be the internet service itself.

Re:Chinese internet is still in the 90s by creamyhorror on Friday June 13, 2025 @01:05PM (#44270265)
I believe it also depends on whether you're using residential broadband or mobile data. Mobile data could be significantly smoother (at least it was when I was there years ago).