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Ethernet packet-rate calculator

Translate line speed and MAC frame size into one-way packets per second with Ethernet wire overhead.

Networking

Ethernet packet-rate calculator

Translate line speed and MAC frame size into one-way packets per second with Ethernet wire overhead.

Example inputs · Replace these with your measurements to build your plan.

Method, example and sources
  1. Include MAC header and FCS in the entered frame size.
  2. Add eight preamble/SFD bytes and twelve inter-frame-gap byte times.
  3. Divide one-way line bits per second by total frame bit times.
  4. Multiply by ingress ports without counting egress a second time.

Worked example. At 1 Gbps, 64-byte Ethernet frames occupy 84 byte times and yield approximately 1,488,095 packets per second per direction.

Your planning result

Ethernet wire-rate packet budget

Frame bytes include the MAC header and FCS. The wire adds eight preamble/SFD bytes and twelve inter-frame-gap byte times.

Per-port one-way rate
1,488,095.2381packets/s
Aggregate ingress rate
35.7143Mpps
Per-port MAC client data ceiling
0.5476Gbps
  • This is a theoretical full-size-frame timing budget for the entered size, not measured forwarding performance. Aggregate ingress does not double-count full-duplex egress. VLAN tags must already be in the entered frame size; the client-data metric assumes an untagged 14-byte MAC header plus 4-byte FCS.

From the catalog

Switches & Bridges

Explore related listings, then confirm the exact model requirements against your plan. These listings are not an automatic compatibility or capacity verdict.

Browse switches & bridges Browse network interface cards Get help with the specification

How to use this result

Small packets require a switch to make more forwarding decisions for the same line speed. A throughput specification in gigabits alone therefore cannot describe every workload. This worksheet converts the selected frame length into packet rate and includes the time occupied by preamble and inter-frame gap, which do not appear inside the MAC frame itself.

What to verify next

The result is a theoretical traffic budget. A switch benchmark depends on enabled features, packet mix, forwarding paths and the vendor's counting convention. Confirm whether a quoted aggregate figure sums ingress and egress before comparing it with this one-way ingress result. Tagged frames must include their tags in the entered frame length; jumbo-frame support must be confirmed separately.

Worked example

At 1 Gbps, 64-byte Ethernet frames occupy 84 byte times and yield approximately 1,488,095 packets per second per direction.

Ethernet packet-rate calculator — Uniqcli