Just Like We All Thought, Stadia Will Require High Speed Internet

If you caught yesterday’s GDC keynote presentation from Google where the company announced its Stadia game streaming service, you were probably left with a few questions.

With all the hype, hype, hype going on during the presentation, the company kind of skipped over a few important details.

While most of us might be more or less on board with Google attempting a run at the game streaming service thing, we’ve seen this idea before — and there were issues, particularly around users internet capabilities.

Interestingly, Google didn’t linger much on details about how good someone’s internet will need to be in order to use Stadia. So what happens if you live in an area with less than stellar service — or use a service that caps your data, such as some Xfinity accounts?

While we still don’t have an answer to the second part of that question, we do have one for the first half.

Following the keynote yesterday, Kotaku’s Maddy Meyers spoke with Phil Harrison, vice president and GM at Google, about the streaming service, asking what internet speeds are required to reliably run Stadia.

According to Harrison, players hoping to get 1080p at 60 FPS will need around 25 MBps in order to get the best out of it. Apparently, users can run with less, but this is the recommended speed.

As for those hoping to stream 4K with Stadia, they’ll need about 30Mbps.

Ideally, the system will adjust the resolution of a game based on the user-end speeds. But that does mean anyone with lower speeds or iffy connections won’t receive the best service. And it definitely means anyone in rural areas or those using satellite will probably want to just buy hard copies of their games as usual.

During the interview, Meyers also asked Harrison about the hardware required to get Stadia on the TV. Doing so will require Chromecast and the Stadia controller.

If you’re on PC, any controller, or mouse and keyboard, will work, including those for PS4 and Xbox One.

As of this writing, there is still no firm release window or price point for Stadia. Alongside Stadia and the Stadia controller, Google also announced the creation of the Stadia Games and Entertainment Division.