Latency (engineering)

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Latency, from a general point of view, is a time delay between the cause and the effect of some physical change in the system being observed. Lag, as it is known in gaming circles, refers to the latency between the input to a simulation and the visual or auditory response, often occurring because of network delay in online games.^[1]

Latency is physically a consequence of the limited velocity at which any physical interaction can propagate. The magnitude of this velocity is always less than or equal to the speed of light. Therefore, every physical system with any physical separation (distance) between cause and effect will experience some sort of latency, regardless of the nature of the stimulation to which it has been exposed.

The precise definition of latency depends on the system being observed or the nature of the simulation. In communications, the lower limit of latency is determined by the medium being used to transfer information. In reliable two-way communication systems, latency limits the maximum rate at which information can be transmitted, as there is often a limit on the amount of information that is in-flight at any given moment. Perceptible latency has a strong effect on user satisfaction and usability in the field of human–machine interaction.^[2]

In software systems, benchmarking against "average" and "median" latency can be misleading because few outlier numbers can distort them. Instead, software architects and software developers are advised to use "99th percentile": for example if 99th percentile latency is 2 seconds, this means that 99th percent of the requests finished within 2 seconds. This gives a more realistic view about the latency.^[3]