Improving Latency with Active Queue Management (AQM) During COVID-19

During the COVID-19 pandemic the Comcast network performed well in response to unprecedented changes in Internet usage1 2 3 4. Video communications applications such as Zoom, WebEx, and FaceTime have exploded in popularity – applications that happen to be sensitive to network latency. However, in today’s typical networks – such as a home network – those applications often degrade if they are sharing a network link with other network traffic. This is a problem caused by a network design flaw often described using the term ‘buffer bloat’. Several years ago, Comcast helped to fund research & development in the technical community into new Active Queue Management (AQM) techniques to eliminate this issue and this was later built into Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS) standards5 6 7.