Quantitative and Subjective Evaluation of Latency and Packet Loss Effects on Video Streaming Quality Using Controlled Network Emulation
Abstract
With the rapid growth of high-speed internet and increasingly advanced smart devices, the way we consume media has changed dramatically, with video streaming now becoming the dominant form of digital content delivery. Despite this shift, the quality of experience (QoE) still depends heavily on network conditions, especially latency (LT) and packet loss (PL). In this study, we explore the individual and combined effects of LT and PL on video quality (VQ) using a mix of objective and subjective metrics. We built a controlled experimental testbed using media player VLC to stream videos, Clumsy to simulate network impairments, and FFmpeg to compute the peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR). Video streams (240p-480p resolution, 128-512 kbps bitrate, 25 fps) were delivered via a wireless network (UDP) at varying LT levels (0-200 milliseconds) and PL (0-10%). Subjective quality was assessed using the mean opinion score (MOS) from 30 participants in a randomized video-viewing condition. Results show that LT had only a small effect on objective VQ, with PSNR dropping slightly (e.g., from 36.8 dB to 36.0 dB at 128 kbps as LT increased from 0 to 200 ms), but had a noticeable effect on user perception, with MOS reducing from ~4.5-4.9 to 2.8-3.5. On the other hand, PL had a much stronger impact on both measured and perceived quality. Even a 1% PL dropped PSNR by up to 3.6 dB (e.g., from 36.8 dB to 33.2 dB at 128 kbps) and noticeably lowered MOS. At higher loss rates (7-10%), PSNR significantly decreased to around 24 dB, and MOS fell below 2.0, indicating poor to unacceptable quality. The findings reveal that PL is much more detrimental to VQ than LT, although higher bitrates can offer some resilience under adverse network conditions. These results provide quantitative guidelines and practical insights for enhancing video streaming systems and improving QoE in real-world networks.References
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DOI:
https://doi.org/10.31449/inf.v50i14.14459Keywords:
video streaming quality, network latency, peak signal-to-noise ratio, network performance evaluation, real-time video transmissionDownloads
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