AFRICLOUD Launches Network Looking Glass for Diagnostics

AFRICLOUD, the high-performance VPS hosting provider serving underserved markets across Africa, Europe, and South America, today announced the launch of its advanced Network Looking Glass system. This public tool lets anyone test how quickly and reliably they can reach AFRICLOUD's network from their own location-before choosing a VPS plan.

What is the AFRICLOUD Looking Glass?

It's a simple, web-based way to run safe connectivity checks from AFRICLOUD's network to your target (for example, a website or IP). You see real-world latency and path behaviour so you can choose the best data centre location for your audience.

A Looking Glass is an industry-standard tool that network operators provide for transparency. It allows prospective and existing customers to verify network performance without needing to contact support or request internal reports. AFRICLOUD's implementation is designed to be both powerful for network engineers and accessible for business users evaluating hosting options.

Key benefits for business users

Test performance from two regions

Run checks from Lisbon (Portugal) and Johannesburg (South Africa) to understand how users in Europe and Africa will experience your service. Lisbon serves West Africa, North Africa, and Europe with excellent latency, while Johannesburg provides optimal connectivity for Southern and East Africa.

Make data-driven hosting decisions

• Measure latency from your network to AFRICLOUD data centres
• Compare Lisbon vs Johannesburg performance for your specific location
• Identify potential routing slowdowns or suboptimal paths early
• Validate connectivity before committing to a hosting plan
• Share results with stakeholders to justify infrastructure decisions

Fast, user-friendly experience

The interface is clean and intuitive, auto-detects your IP, and shows results instantly-no expert knowledge required for basic tests. Results are presented in a clear, readable format with colour-coded latency indicators.

For technical users

Supported tests (today)

• Ping (IPv4 & IPv6) - Quick latency checks that measure round-trip time (RTT) to your target. Useful for baseline latency assessment and checking if a host is reachable. IPv6 support ensures you can test modern dual-stack deployments.
• Traceroute - See the exact path your traffic takes from AFRICLOUD to your destination. Each hop shows the router hostname, IP address, and latency. Identify where bottlenecks occur in the routing chain.
• MTR (My Traceroute) - Continuous traceroute with statistics over multiple packets. MTR combines ping and traceroute into a single diagnostic, showing packet loss percentage and latency variance at each hop. This is the most powerful tool for diagnosing intermittent network issues.

Interpreting results

When reviewing Looking Glass output, pay attention to these key metrics:

• Round-trip time (RTT): Lower is better. Under 50ms is excellent for same-continent traffic; under 150ms is acceptable for intercontinental.
• Packet loss: Any packet loss above 1% indicates a problem. Consistent loss at a specific hop suggests congestion or faulty equipment on that segment.
• Hop count: Fewer hops generally mean faster, more reliable connections. Direct peering reduces hop count.
• Latency variance: High jitter (varying latency) affects real-time applications like VoIP and gaming more than raw throughput.

Designed for trust and reliability

Built with security best practices and careful data handling, the Looking Glass focuses on safe, read-only diagnostics suitable for public use. Input validation prevents abuse, and results are not stored beyond the session. The tool runs in isolated environments to protect the production network.

How to use it

1. Visit lg.africloud.com
2. Choose a probe location: Lisbon (Portugal) or Johannesburg (South Africa)
3. Enter a target: domain name (e.g., example.com) or IP address (IPv4 or IPv6)
4. Select a test type: Ping, Traceroute, or MTR
5. Click "Run Test" and review the results instantly
6. Optionally, switch locations and repeat to compare both data centres

For the most comprehensive analysis, run MTR from both Lisbon and Johannesburg to your target. This gives you a complete picture of connectivity options.

Common use cases

• Pre-migration validation: Before moving your infrastructure to AFRICLOUD, verify that latency meets your requirements
• Data centre selection: Compare Lisbon vs Johannesburg to determine which location best serves your user base
• Troubleshooting: When users report slowness, use the Looking Glass to identify if the issue is on AFRICLOUD's network or elsewhere
• SLA verification: Document network performance for compliance or contractual purposes
• Peering analysis: Network engineers can analyse routing paths to understand AFRICLOUD's connectivity

Roadmap

• Bandwidth testing - Planned throughput tests (iperf3-based) to help validate end-to-end capacity before deployment
• BGP route viewer - See BGP routing information and prefix announcements
• Historical data - Optional account-based result storage for trend analysis

Why it matters

• Reduce risk - Validate performance before migrating or launching. No surprises after you've committed.
• Delight users - Choose the location that minimises latency for your audience, improving their experience.
• Prove connectivity - Demonstrate AFRICLOUD's highly peered network to stakeholders, investors, or technical decision-makers.
• Save time - Get answers instantly without waiting for support tickets or sales calls.

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About AFRICLOUD

AFRICLOUD delivers high-performance VPS hosting from strategic data centres in Lisbon and Johannesburg, with NVMe storage, KVM virtualisation, and a 99.9% uptime commitment. Our network is designed for low-latency connectivity to African markets, with extensive peering at major European and African Internet exchange points.

Get started

Try the Looking Glass at lg.africloud.com. When you're ready, explore VPS plans at africloud.com. For businesses planning a migration, check our VPS migration guide for step-by-step instructions.

Need help? Visit our support portal.

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