Lisbon to Brazil: Achieving 70ms Latency with Direct European VPS Hosting

For businesses and individuals requiring low-latency connectivity between Europe and Brazil, server location matters enormously. Traditional routing often sends traffic from Europe through North American networks before reaching South America, adding unnecessary milliseconds to every request. However, direct submarine cable infrastructure connecting Portugal to Brazil's northeast coast offers a compelling alternative, with real-world latency as low as 70 milliseconds from a strategically located VPS provider.

AFRICLOUD conducted comprehensive network testing from our Lisbon data centre to 29 cities across Brazil, analysing 132 MTR traces to map actual performance. The results demonstrate that Lisbon-based virtual private servers can achieve excellent connectivity to Brazil, particularly for the country's northeastern region.

The Direct Route Advantage

When traffic flows directly from Lisbon to Brazil via submarine cables landing at Fortaleza, packets travel approximately 5,500 kilometres across the Atlantic. Compare this to the traditional US transit route: Lisbon to Madrid, London, New York, then Miami before finally reaching Brazil, covering nearly twice the distance and crossing the Atlantic twice.

Our testing confirmed this difference quantitatively. Direct-routed connections to Brazil's northeast averaged 118ms latency, whilst US-transit connections averaged 218ms, representing a 46% improvement when using the direct path. For latency-sensitive applications, this difference is substantial. As we explored in our analysis of why server proximity matters for business applications, even modest latency reductions compound into meaningful user experience improvements.

Latency Performance by Brazilian City

We categorised the 29 tested cities into performance tiers based on achievable round-trip times:

Tier A: Excellent (Below 100ms)

Six Brazilian cities achieved sub-100ms latency from Lisbon:

• Fortaleza (CE): 70ms best, 121ms average - the primary submarine cable landing point
• Natal (RN): 76ms best, 109ms average
• João Pessoa (PB): 76ms best, 113ms average
• Maceió (AL): 87ms best, 189ms average
• Recife (PE): 90ms best, 147ms average
• Aracaju (SE): 95ms best, 129ms average

All Tier A cities are located in Brazil's Northeast region, benefiting from proximity to submarine cable landing infrastructure.

Tier B: Good (100-150ms)

Thirteen cities fell within the 100-150ms range, suitable for most interactive applications:

• Salvador (BA): 105ms - Northeast
• Palmas (TO): 110ms - North
• Macapá (AP): 116ms - North
• Manaus (AM): 119ms - North (Amazon region)
• Teresina (PI): 123ms - Northeast
• Goiânia (GO): 125ms - Central-West
• Vitória (ES): 130ms - Southeast
• Rio de Janeiro (RJ): 131ms - Southeast
• Belém (PA): 135ms - North
• São Luís (MA): 136ms - Northeast
• Belo Horizonte (MG): 138ms - Southeast
• Guarulhos (SP): 140ms - Southeast
• Campinas (SP): 148ms - Southeast

Tier C: Acceptable (150-200ms)

Nine cities showed latencies between 150-200ms:

• Brasília (DF): 150ms - the federal capital
• Florianópolis (SC): 151ms - South
• Campo Grande (MS): 154ms - Central-West
• Porto Alegre (RS): 158ms - South
• São Paulo (SP): 165ms - Southeast (Brazil's largest city)
• Cuiabá (MT): 173ms - Central-West
• Boa Vista (RR): 178ms - North
• Rio Branco (AC): 186ms - North (Amazon region)

Tier D: Challenging (Above 200ms)

Only two cities exceeded 200ms:

• Porto Velho (RO): 225ms
• Curitiba (PR): 237ms

Interestingly, Curitiba's higher latency likely results from routing inefficiencies rather than distance, as it is geographically closer to São Paulo than several Tier B cities.

Regional Performance Summary

Aggregating by Brazilian region reveals clear patterns:

• Northeast: 145ms average - best overall connectivity
• Southeast: 179ms average - includes São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro
• Central-West: 195ms average
• North: 207ms average - Amazon region challenges
• South: 231ms average - furthest from cable landing points

The Northeast region's superior performance stems from its proximity to Fortaleza, where transatlantic cables make landfall. Traffic destined for southeastern cities like São Paulo often travels north to Fortaleza first, then south via Brazil's domestic backbone.

Business Applications

These latency figures translate into tangible benefits across multiple use cases:

Software as a Service (SaaS)

European SaaS providers expanding into Brazilian markets can serve customers from Lisbon infrastructure whilst maintaining responsive user experiences. With sub-150ms latency to Brazil's major economic centres, web applications remain snappy and API responses feel immediate. Conversely, Brazilian SaaS companies can use Lisbon servers to serve European customers whilst maintaining acceptable performance for their home market. This approach mirrors how African startups leverage strategically positioned VPS infrastructure to reach global markets.

Financial Technology

Fintech applications processing cross-border transactions between Europe and Brazil benefit from reduced round-trip times. Payment confirmations, real-time balance updates, and trading platforms all perform better with lower latency. The 70-130ms achievable to major Brazilian financial centres compares favourably with alternatives.

Gaming and Real-Time Applications

Multiplayer gaming servers, voice communication platforms, and collaborative tools require consistent low latency. Whilst competitive gaming typically demands sub-50ms, many game genres and real-time applications function well at 100-150ms. Brazilian players connecting to Lisbon-hosted game servers experience noticeably better performance than connecting to US-based alternatives.

E-Commerce Platforms

Online retail depends heavily on page load speed for conversion rates. Studies consistently show that each 100ms of added latency reduces conversion by measurable percentages. European e-commerce businesses targeting Brazilian consumers can improve their competitiveness by hosting in Lisbon rather than more distant locations. Pairing low latency with NVMe storage delivers the performance that modern e-commerce platforms demand.

Content Delivery and Media

Video streaming, content management systems, and media distribution platforms benefit from reduced initial connection times. Whilst cached content typically uses edge networks, origin servers in Lisbon provide faster cache population and better performance for dynamic content serving Brazilian audiences.

Private VPN and Remote Access

Individuals and businesses requiring secure connections between Europe and Brazil find Lisbon-based VPN servers attractive. Remote workers, travellers needing secure access to home resources, and privacy-conscious users benefit from the direct routing. A VPN endpoint in Lisbon offers Brazilian users a European presence with significantly lower latency than alternatives hosted further from submarine cable routes.

Development and Testing

Software development teams distributed between Europe and Brazil can use Lisbon-based development servers, staging environments, and CI/CD infrastructure. The lower latency makes remote pair programming, live code reviews, and collaborative debugging more practical.

Who Benefits Most

Two primary audiences gain the most from Lisbon's positioning:

European businesses expanding to Brazil: Rather than establishing separate Brazilian infrastructure immediately, companies can serve the Brazilian market from Lisbon whilst testing product-market fit. The Northeast region, with cities like Fortaleza, Recife, and Salvador totalling over 15 million people, receives excellent connectivity.

Brazilian users seeking European presence: Whether for accessing European services, establishing a European digital footprint, or serving European customers, Brazilian individuals and businesses can use Lisbon servers knowing their home country remains accessible with reasonable latency.

Technical Considerations

Several factors influence actual performance:

ISP routing: End-user latency depends partly on how Brazilian ISPs route traffic. Some providers peer directly with European networks; others route through US intermediaries regardless of destination.

Time of day: Network congestion varies throughout the day. Our tests captured best-case figures; peak hours may show higher latencies.

Application protocol: TCP-based applications incur additional round trips for connection establishment. UDP-based applications like VoIP or gaming may achieve lower effective latencies.

Content optimisation: Techniques like connection pooling, HTTP/2 multiplexing, and aggressive caching can mitigate latency impact for web applications.

Methodology

Our network analysis used MTR (My Traceroute) to measure round-trip times from AFRICLOUD's Lisbon infrastructure to multiple endpoints in each Brazilian city. We conducted 132 traces across 29 cities, selecting diverse ISPs and hosting providers as targets to capture realistic performance variance. Tests ran during January 2026, with results reflecting current network conditions.

Conclusion

Lisbon's strategic position at the European terminus of direct submarine cables to Brazil creates genuine advantages for latency-sensitive applications. With 70ms achievable to Fortaleza and sub-150ms to most major Brazilian cities, VPS hosting in Portugal offers a compelling option for cross-Atlantic connectivity.

For workloads requiring the lowest possible latency to Brazil's Northeast or acceptable performance nationwide, Lisbon-based infrastructure deserves serious consideration. The data confirms what geography suggests: sometimes the shortest path across an ocean beats the longest path around it.

Run your own latency tests using our Network Looking Glass to verify connectivity to your specific Brazilian targets. Ready to deploy? Explore AFRICLOUD's Lisbon VPS plans and experience the direct route advantage for yourself.