The domain has been used to host a speed test since 2000, only became known to the general public after the acquisition by Ookla in 2006. Suttles suggested the name Ookla because he already owned the domain name in honor of his pet cat, who was in turn named for a character on the TV series Thundarr the Barbarian. The owner and operator of, Ookla, was established in 2006 by partners Mike Apgar and Doug Suttles.

This data has been used by numerous publications in the analysis of Internet access data rates around the world. The site also offers detailed statistics based on test results.

To further improve accuracy, now performs tests via direct Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) sockets and uses a custom protocol for communication between servers and clients. Tests were previously performed using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) at Layer 7 of the OSI model. As of September 2018, over 21 billion speed tests have been completed. The tests are performed within the user's web browser or within apps. from the server to the user computer, and the upload data rate, i.e. Each test measures the data rate for the download direction, i.e. The service measures the data throughput ( speed) and latency ( connection delay) of an Internet connection against one of around 11,000 geographically dispersed servers (as of August 2021). It is the flagship product of Ookla, a web testing and network diagnostics company founded in 2006, and based in Seattle, Washington, United States. , also known as Speedtest by Ookla, is a web service that provides free analysis of Internet access performance metrics, such as connection data rate and latency. English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish, Indonesian, Polish, Portuguese, Swedish, Dutch

Ookla speed