[OtinG]

I decided to check the internet speed on my Roku Ultra 2018 and my Fire TV Stick 4K. The latest Roku FW has a menu that allows you to test it. To test the Fire TV I installed the Firefox browser app and ran a speed test via it. The results were somewhat surprising.

I have 200 Mbps internet service. The Roku is normally hooked to an ethernet cable, but the Roku specs show a 10/100 capability. I tested the Roku on both ethernet and 5G WiFi. The Fire TV requires an adapter to hook up ethernet and the specs show it is also only 10/100. I don’t have the optional adapter so I only tested the Fire TV on 5G WiFi.

Roku Ultra 2018 Speed Test

Ethernet = 86 Mbps
WiFi = 77 Mbps

Fire TV Stick 4K Speed Test

WiFi = 135 Mbps

First thought is that even the 77 Mbps should be more than sufficient for streaming HD and probably 4K as well. But I was surprised the Fire TV Stick 4K with WiFi is way faster on internet speed than the Roku with ethernet connection. Since the optional ethernet adapter for the Fire TV is only 10/100 I don’t see a need to pay $15 for it since it will likely be only capable of about 85 Mbps and thus slower than my WiFi connection.

For reference my iPhone and iPads on WiFi typically get about 209 Mbps speed as do my two Macs connected via ethernet. Both Macs have Gigabit ethernet capability.

ETA: I added the speed tests for my Fire TV 3rd Generation and my Roku Express 2018.

Roku Express 2018 Speed Test

WiFi = 37 Mbps

Fire TV 3rd Gen Speed Test

WiFi = 80 Mbps

Even though the Roku Express only has about a third up to half the WiFi speed as the other three devices, I have never had significant streaming issues with it, even on Hulu Live TV. As a matter of fact, the cheaper Express is way more reliable than my Ultra model.