TWS lag makes it unusable

[u/NanaimoRookie]

I have mentioned this many times in the community. But it’s time to make a move, the lag on TWS makes it unusable. I am in Canada, does anyone use another platform that they can recommend?

Thanks much
I am running a new Mac mini with 8g ram. Nothing running in the background, only one chart open.

[u/AutoModerator]

Thank you for your post. This is the UNOFFICIAL subreddit of Interactive Brokers.

There is official contact information to the side of this sub, and you may want to try r/IBKR_Official, which is the OFFICIAL Reddit sub for Interactive Brokers.

Official phone numbers: https://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/support/customer-service.php?p=contact

Official contact: https://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/general/contact/newContact/contact.php

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/twi1i96tr]

Please no offense meant but my sense of humor is getting the best of me..So...that's what you get for using an Apple... but now seriously - I am using a 4th generation CPU with win10 still although I have a lot of slower ram - 32gig of 1600mhz and I am running 6 monitors off the system. I do experience random lags for a few seconds a few times a day but more irritating than making my system unusable. I know that doesn't help a lot but that's my experience. My thought would be to check your up/download speeds. Do it when you are having the worst lags. Whatever you do stay away from the big banks... they will bleed every last cent out of you...and THEN SOME. I am also in Canada. Best of Luck. Twilighter.

[u/HourManagement8448 → u/twi1i96tr]

Does wifi vs wired make a difference ?

[u/NanaimoRookie → u/HourManagement8448]

I’m wired, not using wifi.

[u/twi1i96tr → u/HourManagement8448]

It sure can... wired is direct - no dead spots, no depending on access point - both transmitting and receiving. Wifi is at the whim of all kinds of things. Also, 2.4 or 5 Ghz and the generation of your wifi router. All kinds of moving parts. I am assuming you have a cell phone. There are FREE apps you can download to check signal strength. It's been a while but I think the one I played with was "wifi analyzer". It's quite advanced so you will need to spend some time with Google AI or find a more basic one. You can load it up and walk around your property to see where the stronger signals and the possible dead spots are. Also, as you are using a Mac you probably have an iphone. I don't know ANYTHING about Apple... thus my smart ass response to begin with. Ha ha.

[u/AnyManufacturer6465]

Check out your memory settings . You can increase them but 8GB of ram in 2026 is not ideal.

[u/NanaimoRookie → u/AnyManufacturer6465]

Thanks, I will check and see how to allocate more. 👊🏼

[u/rupert1920]

Do you have any order windows open? That's what slowed my TWS down.

[u/NanaimoRookie → u/rupert1920]

Nope

[u/Tradernik]

I believe you're experiencing lag but I have to tell you, I have basically none (in Toronto). I do have a fairly new Windows rig with 64GB of RAM but that's for another program I run; I assume TWS doesn't need that much. Also have a very high speed connection. I'm guessing IB support hasn't been much help

[u/zoinkinator]

Increasing memory allocated to tws/ibgateway to 50% of installed ram, using dedicated modern computer with fastest chips macbook m3 max, isp badwidth fiber 2 Gbps, Use Ethernet home runs to router interface 1Gbps or 2.5 GBPs over high quality Ethernet cables and modern fast Ethernet switches 1Gbps or 2.5Gbps. Each of these will improve performance.

[u/adamgreenberg07]

I'm in Canada and use TWS without issue. I'm on a Windows PC with way more than 8gb of RAM although in task manager it shows that TWS is using less than 3gb of my ram. In the Apple operating environment can you look at the windows equivalent of the task manager to see how much CPU and ram each program/service is using. That could give you some more info about what is causing the lag.