Geng Gao | the Blog | design, software, gadgets topics... |

DNS stands for Domain Name System. It translates computer hostnames such as www.example.com into IP addresses like 208.77.188.166. ISPs and many online services offer DNS service for consumers. For example, OpenDNS is one of the services that offers features like phishing filter, domain blocking and typo correction. Just this month, Google released its own DNS service Google Public DNS which claims performance and security advantages.

If you are a geek/power-user, or someone simply want to get a faster internet experience? Setting up a DNS will do it, but depending on your location the Fastest DNS for me may not be fast on your computer.  Namebench is a free open-source benchmark software that will find the Fastest DNS Server for you. [Mac OS X, Windows, and UNIX]

This is the UI you see when open the program. Simply choose the data source and number of tests and click the Start Benchmark.

Then after a while, the result will be opened in your browser. A list of DNS services results will appear.

As you can see, my current DNS service is 42% faster then OpenDNS. Looks like Google Public DNS is faster for me.

There are more detailed graphs.

(Click the image for a larger version)

Namebench is a free, open-source download, works with Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.  Give it a try, it only takes 10mins or so.

Also feel free to tell us what DNS server scores highest for you in the comments.