How to Run a Traceroute and Read the Results

Traceroute is one of the most useful network diagnostic tools available. It shows you the path your data takes from your device to a destination, revealing every router (hop) along the way. This guide will teach you how to run one and understand the results.

What Is a Traceroute?

A traceroute maps the network path between your device and a destination server. For each "hop" (router) along the way, it shows:

• The hop number
• The IP address (or hostname) of the router
• The round-trip latency in milliseconds

This information helps you identify where network slowdowns or failures are occurring.

Try It Online First

The easiest way to run a traceroute is with our online traceroute tool. Just enter a hostname or IP address and we will run the traceroute from our server and display the results — no command line needed.

How to Run a Traceroute on Windows

Windows uses the command tracert (note: not "traceroute").

1. Press Win + R, type cmd, and press Enter
2. Type tracert example.com and press Enter
3. Wait for the results (this can take 30-60 seconds)

C:\> tracert google.com

Tracing route to google.com [142.250.80.46]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1     1 ms     1 ms     1 ms  192.168.1.1
  2     8 ms     7 ms     9 ms  10.0.0.1
  3    12 ms    11 ms    12 ms  172.16.0.1
  4    15 ms    14 ms    15 ms  142.250.80.46

Trace complete.

How to Run a Traceroute on Mac

1. Open Terminal (Applications > Utilities > Terminal)
2. Type traceroute example.com and press Enter

$ traceroute google.com
traceroute to google.com (142.250.80.46), 30 hops max
 1  192.168.1.1 (192.168.1.1)  1.234 ms  0.987 ms  1.102 ms
 2  10.0.0.1 (10.0.0.1)  8.456 ms  7.890 ms  9.012 ms
 3  172.16.0.1 (172.16.0.1)  12.345 ms  11.678 ms  12.901 ms
 4  142.250.80.46 (142.250.80.46)  15.234 ms  14.567 ms  15.890 ms

How to Run a Traceroute on Linux

1. Open a terminal
2. Type traceroute example.com and press Enter
3. If traceroute is not installed: sudo apt install traceroute (Ubuntu/Debian) or sudo yum install traceroute (RHEL/CentOS)

How to Read Traceroute Results

Hop Number

Each line represents one "hop" — a router your data passes through. Hop 1 is usually your home router. The last hop is the destination server.

Latency (ms)

Three time measurements show the round-trip time for each test packet. Lower numbers are better. Look for sudden large increases between hops, which indicate a bottleneck.

Asterisks (* * *)

If you see * * * for a hop, it means that router did not respond. This is common and does not necessarily indicate a problem — many routers are configured to ignore traceroute packets for security reasons.

What to Look For

• Consistent low latency — Normal, healthy connection
• Sudden latency spike — Potential bottleneck at that hop
• All subsequent hops show high latency — The problem is at the hop where latency first increased
• Only one hop shows high latency — That router is slow but the overall path is fine (ICMP rate limiting)
• Traceroute never completes — The destination may be blocking ICMP/UDP packets, or there is a routing problem

When to Use Traceroute

• Slow website loading — Identify which network segment is causing delays
• Connection timeouts — Find where packets are being dropped
• Routing issues — See if traffic is taking an unexpected path
• ISP troubleshooting — Provide your ISP with traceroute data when reporting issues

Traceroute vs. Ping

Ping tells you if a destination is reachable and how long it takes. Traceroute shows you every step along the way. Use ping for quick connectivity checks and traceroute when you need to diagnose where a problem is occurring.

Advanced Traceroute Options

You can also look up the IP address of any hop using our IP Lookup tool to find out which network or ISP owns that router, or use our WHOIS tool for detailed registration information.