How to run a Traceroute

Traceroute is a program available on most computers that shows you the path (route) between your computer and a server. It will indicate all the intermediate routers (points) your connection passes through to reach a server. It’s a helpful tool to determine if your connection to a specific server is problematic, and where the problem lies. Alternatively, run an MTR.

Running a traceroute is different for each Operating System. Here are the steps for the most common Operating Systems:


  • Windows 10 and 11

    1. 1
      Go to the Windows start bar and type in ‘cmd’ or ‘Command prompt’
    2. 2
      Open the Command Prompt application
    3. 3
      Once Command Prompt opens up, type in’ tracert’ followed by the domain name or IP address and press Enter. E.g. tracert xneelo.co.za or tracert 41.203.23.117





  • Windows 8

    1. 1
      Open the Charm Bar by moving your mouse cursor to the top-right of the screen. If you are using a touch screen open the Charm Bar by swiping from the right-hand side of the screen.
    2. 2
      Select ‘Search’
    3. 3
      In the ‘Search box’ type: run
    4. 4
      Select ‘Run’ then type: cmd
    5. 5
      Select ‘OK’
    6. 5
      In command prompt, type ‘tracert’ and the domain name or IP address. E.g. tracert xneelo.co.za or tracert 41.203.23.117





  • Windows Vista or Windows 7

    1. 1
      Click ‘Start’
    2. 2
      In the ‘Start Search’ box type: cmd
    3. 3
      Click the search icon (that little magnifying glass) or press Enter. The command prompt should open.
    4. 4
      In command prompt, type ‘tracert’ and the domain name or IP address. E.g. tracert xneelo.co.za or tracert 41.203.23.117





  • Windows XP

    1. 1
      Click ‘Start’
    2. 2
      Select ‘Run’
    3. 3
      In the Run dialog box next to ‘Open’ type: cmd
    4. 4
      Click ‘OK’ or press Enter. A Command Prompt window should open
    5. 5
      In the Command Prompt type, ‘tracert’ and the domain name or IP address. E.g. tracert xneelo.co.za or tracert 41.203.23.117





  • Apple Mac OS X

    1. 1
      Go to ‘Finder’
    2. 2
      Open the ‘Applications’ folder
    3. 3
      Click ‘Utilities’
    4. 4
      Select or double click ‘Terminal’
    5. 5
      In Terminal type ‘traceroute’ and the domain name or IP address. E.g. traceroute xneelo.co.za or traceroute 41.203.23.117





  • Linux

    1. 1
      Open ‘Terminal’
    2. 2
      In Terminal type ‘traceroute’ and the domain name or IP address. E.g. traceroute xneelo.co.za or traceroute 41.203.23.117





  • Example of what your Traceroute will look like 

    Tracing route to xneelo.co.za [41.203.23.117] over a maximum of 30 hops:
 1 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 192.168.1.1
 2 11 ms 17 ms 14 ms 12-345-678-9.your-isp.com [12.345.678.9]
 3 11 ms 11 ms 11 ms example.router-1.your-isp.com [123.45.67.8]
 4 11 ms 10 ms 11 ms 987-65-4-3.example.your-isp.com [987.65.4.3]
 5 13 ms 15 ms 13 ms another-router-2.your-isp.com [23.456.78.910]
 6 24 ms 11 ms 13 ms another-router-3.your-isp.com [345.5.67.8]
 7 12 ms 12 ms 11 ms another-router-4.your-isp.com [45.678.910.11]
 8 12 ms 11 ms 12 ms xneelo-upstream-provider-peering-point
 9 43 ms 41 ms 40 ms xneelo-upstream-provider-router
 10 41 ms 40 ms 40 ms xneelo-upstream-provider-router
 11 44 ms 40 ms 41 ms xneelo-upstream-provider-router
 12 41 ms 48 ms 39 ms xneelo-upstream-provider-router
 13 44 ms 40 ms 39 ms xneelo-core-access
 14 42 ms 40 ms 40 ms xneelo-row-access
 15 40 ms 40 ms 48 ms xneelo.co.za [41.203.23.117]
 Trace complete.

    Examine your Traceroute Results

    • There are 15 ‘hops’ with 3 time tests (probes) in each; reporting how long (in milliseconds i.e. ms) it took to get to that point and return
    • Each ‘hop’ shows the IP address of the router (a device used for routing internet traffic) and/or its name
    • If no response is received from a router, the milliseconds are replaced by an asterisk (*). This could mean that that specific hop has purposely been configured to not respond to traceroute ‘probes’
    • Run ‘Traceroute’ several times, as the first iteration usually reports artificially long ping times
    • Hops 1 through to 7 mainly show the responses on routes taken by your Internet Service Provider (ISP).
    • Hops 8 to 12 show the responses from xneelo’s current upstream provider
    • The remainder of the hops show the responses from the internal xneelo network
    • When you interpret the results and are seeing response times that are greater than 100 ms(milliseconds) on local connections and 500 ms on international connections, or you see asterisks you are almost certain to experience slowness and/or connection issues





  • What Asterisks (timeouts) mean

    Timeout responses, represented by an asterisk(*) can occur for various reasons.

    Below are three examples and their meanings.

    1) Single asterisk

    Tracing route to example.com (93.184.216.34) over a maximum of 30 hops:
 1 router.local (192.168.1.1)  1.123 ms  1.084 ms  1.052 ms 
 2 10.0.0.1 (10.0.0.1)  5.245 ms  5.233 ms  5.218 ms
 3 *  192.0.2.1 (192.0.2.1)  12.485 ms  12.450 ms
 4 203.0.113.5 (203.0.113.5)  19.236 ms  19.203 ms  19.170 ms
 5 example.com (93.184.216.34)  25.483 ms  25.450 ms  25.415 ms

    What does this mean?

    Hop 3 has a single asterisk which means one of the three probes sent to that hop timed out, while the other two probes succeeded in receiving a response. This can mean that there may be an intermittent problem at that hop.

    2) Three asterisks, then failure

    Tracing route to example.com (93.184.216.34 over a maximum of 30 hops:
 1  router.local (192.168.1.1)  1.123 ms  1.084 ms  1.052 ms
 2  10.0.0.1 (10.0.0.1)  5.245 ms  5.233 ms  5.218 ms
 3  203.0.113.1 (203.0.113.1)  12.485 ms  12.450 ms  12.410 ms
 4  198.51.100.1 (198.51.100.1)  18.765 ms  18.730 ms  18.693 ms
 5  * * *
 6  * * *
 7  * * *
 8  * * *
 9  * * *
10  * * *
11  * * *
12  * * *
13  * * *
14  * * *
15  * * *
16  * * *
17  * * *
18  * * *
19  * * *
20  * * *
21  * * *
22  * * *
23  * * *
24  * * *
25  * * *
26  * * *
27  * * *
28  * * *
29  * * *
30  * * *

Traceroute has reached the maximum number of hops (30) and did not reach the destination.

    What does this mean?

    Each * * * indicates a timeout for all three probes at that hop. This failure can occur for various reasons, such as an unreachable target host or a firewall blocking traceroute probes.

    3) Three asterisks, then success

    Tracing route to example.com (93.184.216.34) over a maximum of 30 hops:
 1  router.local (192.168.1.1)  1.123 ms  1.084 ms  1.052 ms
 2  10.0.0.1 (10.0.0.1)  5.245 ms  5.233 ms  5.218 ms
 3  203.0.113.1 (203.0.113.1)  12.485 ms  12.450 ms  12.410 ms
 4  198.51.100.1 (198.51.100.1)  18.765 ms  18.730 ms  18.693 ms
 5  * * *
 6  example.com (93.184.216.34)  25.483 ms  25.450 ms  25.415 ms

    What does this mean?

    Hop 5 indicates that all three probes for that hop timed out, meaning no response was received.

    Hop 6 successfully reaches the destination (example.com), showing three response times. This is not a problem and shows that the device at that hop is configured to ignore traceroute probes.



Assist Note

If you are unsure about how to interpret the traceroute results, kindly send the complete results to support@xneelo.com so that we may assist you with the interpretation.

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