Traceroute Tool
Trace the network path to any hostname or IP address and identify each routing hop from the server.
About the Traceroute Tool
Traceroute is a network diagnostic tool that reveals the path network packets take as they travel from one point to another across the internet. Each intermediate router the packets pass through is called a hop. For each hop, the tool records the router's IP address (and hostname where available) and the round-trip time (RTT) in milliseconds.
What traceroute tells you
- Network path — The sequence of routers between the source and destination. Useful for identifying which network operators are carrying your traffic.
- Latency per hop — Where delays are being introduced. A sudden spike in RTT at a specific hop points to a bottleneck or congested link at that location.
- Packet loss — If a hop shows asterisks (
*) it may be dropping or not responding to probe packets. - Routing anomalies — Traffic being sent internationally when it should stay local, or routing through unexpected ASNs.
Reading traceroute output
Each row in the output represents one hop (router). The columns show:
- Hop number — The sequence position in the path (1 is the first router after the source)
- Hostname / IP — The address of the router at that hop (some routers do not respond or have private IPs)
- RTT (ms) — Round-trip time for probe packets to reach that hop and return
An asterisk (*) means no response was received from that hop. This is common — many routers are configured to not respond to traceroute probes. A single unresponsive hop followed by normal hops does not indicate a problem. However, consecutive asterisks at the end of the trace usually mean the destination is unreachable or blocking the probes.
High latency interpretation
High RTT at a specific hop does not necessarily indicate a problem at that hop — it may simply be de-prioritising probe responses. What matters more is whether all subsequent hops also show high RTT. If latency spikes at hop 8 and remains high for hops 9–15, the bottleneck is likely at or before hop 8. If hop 8 shows high RTT but hop 9 is lower, the router at hop 8 is likely just rate-limiting responses.