Self-hosted latency and bandwidth testing for your server
A lightweight self-hosted network tester for measuring connections to your server, with a shared results leaderboard for friends and clients.
- 📶 Latency testing — 40 requests with individual results, median, average, minimum, maximum, jitter, packet loss, and a quality rating.
- 🚀 Bandwidth testing — 2 MB download and upload speed tests.
- 🏆 Shared Results — friends and clients can test the same ServerPulse server and compare their latest results in one place.
- 👤 Anonymous participant ID — a generated client ID identifies your results without requiring an account or password.
- ⏱️ Rate limiting — latency and bandwidth submissions are independently limited to once every 20 seconds.
- ✏️ Username editing — usernames can be changed once per hour.
- 💾 Persistent results — leaderboard data is stored in SQLite on the hosting server.
- 📍 Server location — displays the approximate location of the server hosting ServerPulse.
- 🔒 Privacy-friendly — no accounts, analytics, advertising, or stored user IP addresses.
- 📱 Responsive UI — designed to work on desktop and mobile browsers.
- 🌙 Dark-first design — clean interface for comfortable use across devices.
Clone the repository to your hosting server or deployment environment.
git clone https://github.com/MinecadeXD/ServerPulse.git
cd ServerPulsenpm installServerPulse requires a PORT environment variable. Your hosting provider will normally provide the port that the application must use.
For example:
PORT=3000The value above is only an example. Use the port required by your hosting provider.
npm startOpen the hosting address provided by your hosting provider.
Give the ServerPulse address to your friends or clients. Everyone can open the same address from their own device, run the latency or bandwidth tests, and view the shared Results leaderboard.
For local development only, you can provide your own PORT value and access ServerPulse through localhost, for example:
PORT=3000Then open:
http://localhost:3000
ServerPulse intentionally keeps configuration small.
Controls the HTTP port used by the Node.js server.
PORT=3000The value is normally supplied by your hosting provider. ServerPulse does not use a fallback port; startup fails if PORT is missing or invalid.
The repository includes a sample configuration:
PORT=3000This is only an example value. Set PORT to the port required by your hosting provider.
Important: Never commit your real
.envfile. It is ignored by Git.
ServerPulse is deployed on a server you control or have access to. You share its address with friends or clients, and each person measures the connection from their own browser to that same ServerPulse host.
The latency test performs 40 requests to the ServerPulse server and records each response time.
It then calculates:
- Median latency
- Average latency
- Minimum latency
- Maximum latency
- Jitter
- Packet loss
- Overall quality rating
The final latency result submitted to the Results leaderboard is the test's median latency.
The bandwidth test measures:
- Download speed
- Upload speed
Both tests use a fixed 2 MB payload. The measured values are submitted independently to the Results leaderboard.
The Results system is intended for shared testing. One person deploys ServerPulse, shares its address with friends or clients, and everyone can submit results to the same leaderboard.
Participants choose a username and receive a locally generated client ID.
The server stores:
- Username
- Anonymous client ID
- Latest latency result
- Latest download speed
- Latest upload speed
- Test timestamps
The leaderboard keeps the latest submitted result, rather than a user's best historical result.
The Results system is designed to remain simple and lightweight.
- Users can register with only a username.
- Users who have not tested yet can still appear as Not tested.
- Latency and bandwidth results are stored independently.
- Latency submissions are limited to once every 20 seconds.
- Bandwidth submissions are limited to once every 20 seconds.
- Username changes are limited to once every 60 minutes.
- The shared Results leaderboard displays up to 100 participants.
- Results are loaded when the Results tab is opened.
- No account, password, email address, or public IP address is required.
The database is created automatically at:
data/serverpulse.db
SQLite database files are intentionally ignored by Git.
ServerPulse/
├── public/
│ ├── index.html
│ ├── style.css
│ └── app.js
├── server.js
├── package.json
├── .env.example
├── .gitignore
├── LICENSE
└── README.md
The SQLite database is generated automatically in the data/ directory when the server starts. It is not part of the repository.
ServerPulse performs a lightweight IP geolocation lookup at server startup to determine the approximate location of the hosting server.
The detected location is cached in memory and displayed by the website.
ServerPulse currently uses ipwho.is for this lookup.
No visitor IP address is stored in the ServerPulse database.
ServerPulse can run on any Node.js-compatible hosting service that supports:
- Node.js 22 or newer
npm installnpm start- A writable filesystem for SQLite
- The hosting provider's
PORTenvironment variable
The data/ directory must be persistent if you want the shared Results leaderboard to survive server restarts, redeployments, or application replacements.
If the hosting provider deletes the SQLite database, the saved Results data will also be lost.
ServerPulse is intentionally designed without user accounts or unnecessary tracking.
- No passwords are collected.
- No email addresses are collected.
- No analytics are included.
- No advertising is included.
- Visitor IP addresses are not stored in the Results database.
- Client IDs are generated locally and are not authentication credentials.
- Usernames are validated on both the client and server.
- Result submissions are rate-limited server-side.
- Database files are excluded from Git.
- Environment files are excluded from Git.
Important: A ServerPulse client ID is only an anonymous participant identifier. It must not be treated as a secure authentication token.
ServerPulse measures the connection from the visitor's browser to the server hosting ServerPulse.
It does not:
- Test every region or data center.
- Measure the connection between two arbitrary servers.
- Provide continuous uptime monitoring.
- Store historical performance graphs.
- Guarantee ISP-wide or nationwide internet speed measurements.
- Replace dedicated network diagnostic tools.
Results can vary depending on the visitor's device, browser, Wi-Fi/mobile connection, ISP, network congestion, and server load.
Check that:
- The Node.js server is running.
- The hosting provider has started the application with
npm start. - The configured
PORTmatches the port expected by the hosting provider. - The server is reachable from your device.
Check:
- The browser console for JavaScript errors.
- That the browser can reach the ServerPulse server.
- That the hosting provider is not blocking the required requests.
- That the Node.js process is still running.
Check:
- The server has a writable
data/directory. - SQLite dependencies installed successfully.
- The Node.js process has not restarted with a fresh or temporary filesystem.
- The server logs for database or API errors.
The Results database is stored on the hosting server.
If the hosting provider resets or replaces the application's persistent storage, data/serverpulse.db may be lost. Use persistent storage if your host provides it.
Contributions are welcome.
Before opening a pull request:
- Keep the project focused on latency, bandwidth, and shared result testing.
- Avoid adding unnecessary external services or tracking.
- Keep the project lightweight and maintainable.
- Update the README when user-facing behavior changes.
- Do not commit
.envfiles, database files, credentials, or generated build output. - Test both the frontend and Node.js server when changing application logic.
If ServerPulse is useful to you:
- ⭐ Star the repository.
- 🐛 Report reproducible bugs through GitHub Issues.
- 💡 Suggest improvements through GitHub Issues.
- 🔧 Submit pull requests for useful, tested improvements.
This project is licensed under the MIT License. See LICENSE for the full license text.