How to fix uTorrent speed problems

 **If you are looking for information on the new WebUI check out my new post on how to use it here**

I’ve noticed several people find my site looking for uTorrent help with speed issues, but are likely put of by my large guide to the whole program so this will be my compact guide to getting uTorrent to run at top speeds for your connection. Get the newest version of uTorrent here.

Before you start reading this, let it be known that torrents are a tricky business sometimes. The speeds aren’t always guaranteed and you won’t always max you connection cap out. It is just the way things are.
1)First thing is first. Do you have a router? If yes, follow along with port forwarding. If not jump to step 5.

2) Ensure you have you have static port for uTorrent. If this confuses you don’t worry. I will explain. Go Options->Preferences->Connection. Now do you see the first part where it says “port used for incoming connection”? Under it is the check box “radomize port each time uTorrent stats”.. Uncheck it and the uPnP box.

3)If you have a router you will want to port forward your connection. And do port forward you need a static IP so the router knows where to look. So, go here to read up on how to set a static IP. If you have more than one computer connected to your computer, make sure all the other pc’s have static IP’s.

4)Now that you have a static IP, time to port forward which is easy enough. Go here and select the type of router you have, and then you just need to select the software you want to forward with (uTorrent of course) so you will scroll to the “U’s” and select uTorrent. From there it will give you a step by step on how to port forward including the step 2 I already took you through.

5) Now, you have port forwarded.Next this is you use a little windows hack to allow you to make more connections to your peers, enabling faster downloads. Go here, download the patch and run it. DO NOT OPEN IT BEYOND 40! Doing so will only screw yourself over. Now you take advantage of opening more connections you need to tell uTorrent you did so.

6) Options->Preferences->Advanced->net.max_halfopen … Here you will want to change the number to no higher than 40. Play around until you find a number that works best for you. I use 40 myself, but some find lower numbers work better. This part will depend on your connection.

7) So, you have port forward (if you had a router), patched windows and told uTorrent to use that extra bit of room. Now, run the speed test. Try to select the preset that is closest to you. Now, download speeds now really matter a lot here when playing with the speed preferences, but upload does. The BT (bit torrent) is built, the more you share the more you get. But this leads to the problem, if you share too much if takes all your connection, share too little and you won’t get anything back.

So, get your average upload speed from the test and do 5-10% less than that. You won’t likely meet it every time you are uploading, but it will cap it if it does. If you find you are maxing your upload every time, increase it a little. If your downloads slow down, put it back down, if not, leave it or set it a little higher.

8) ONLY DOWNLOAD 1OR 2 FILES AT A TIME! You only have so much bandwidth, so realize you can try to download everything at once without feeling it.

9) So everything thing should be running fine. To test, go here and download the latest version.take note of the symbol in the lower status bar. If turns green after a few seconds everything is good. If it yellow or red you may have port forwarded wrong. If you didn’t port forward, your IPS may be blocking torrent traffic.

Also try several different ports if its not green. If this doesn’t work, check the uTorrent site for help.

I would like to thank the guys on the uTorrent forums for all the info.