Basic connectivity troubleshooting [Windows] - World of Warcraft (WoW)

Welcome to this video that will give you
basic steps to address connectivity issues
that may be the cause of in-game delays.
Each chapter of the video can be accessed directly
by clicking the links in the table of contents
currently shown onscreen.
If you are experiencing in-game delays
and cannot figure out why they occur,
we suggest checking our video "WoW - Help, I got lag!".
When checking the tooltip pop-up window
via the computer icon at the bottom of your game interface,
you will see two different values for your latency
called "Home" and "World".
There is a common misconception that "Home" is your personal latency
and "World" is Blizzard's.
In fact, "Home" refers to the connection to your realm server
used to process chat, auction house and add-on data.
On the other hand, "World" covers all the other data
such as combat, other players' and creatures' data,
spell casting and much more.
Generally speaking, the higher your latency value,
the bigger the delay between your actions
and the reaction of the game.
Whether it's "Home", "World" or both,
this might hinder your gaming experience.
The most common causes for high latency, amongst many others,
are wireless connections,
data packet loss,
insufficient bandwidth,
add-ons,
data saturated router
and background applications.
Due to the nature of wireless connections
they often cause connectivity issues.
If you use Wi-Fi, please switch to a cable connection
and check the performance in World of Warcraft again.
If you are not using a wireless connection,
the problem may be caused by your router,
which is the device you connect your network cable to for internet access.
Restarting your router can help in most cases.
To do that, disconnect the router from the power source
for about five minutes
and then reconnect it before testing your game performance again.
Another step while investigating connectivity issues
is to temporarily disable some of your background applications.
These applications are set to start
automatically with your Operating System
and then run in the background.
They include, but are not limited to,
firewalls, antivirus, system utilities
and software you may have installed.
If possible, try to deactivate your firewall and antivirus
and other background applications while troubleshooting,
because they can interfere with the game connection
and further troubleshooting steps.
As keeping your computer safe is very important,
only disable your security software for the time it takes
to identify the cause of the connectivity issue.
It is critical that you DO NOT browse internet pages
while your security software is deactivated.
If you are experiencing connectivity issues,
try to manually disable your add-ons from the add-on panel
in the character selection screen.
Simply click the "Disable all" button
before entering the game and playing for a while.
If this doesn't solve your issue,
you will need to reset your game client to its default setting.
To do so, go to your Windows desktop
and look for the World of Warcraft icon.
Right-click on it and then select "Properties".
Depending on the operating system you have,
you will find an option called "Find target" or "Open file location".
Once you click this, the World of Warcraft installation folder should appear.
In it you will find three important folders.
The Cache folder, which contains temporary files.
The WTF folder, which contains configuration files.
And the Interface folder, which contains user interface elements.
To reset your interface, simply rename these folders
by adding a word or a letter at the end of the folder name.
Oh and don't worry - fresh folders
will be generated automatically once you enter the game again.
Also, the original folders can be restored at any time
by reversing the name change.
Launch the game with this default configuration and play for a while.
If resetting the game's interface resolves the issue,
please be aware that re-enabling your add-ons will probably make it reappear.
Add-ons are great tools designed to modify the user interface.
However, if you use too many of them, if they become out of date
or if you download them from unsafe locations,
they can prevent the game from running normally.
Should your add-ons have caused the issues,
we would suggest downloading the newest versions from safe locations
and reinstalling them one by one
to be able to identify the possible game-breakers.
If you are still experiencing connectivity issues
after switching to the troubleshooting setup
while using default game settings,
move on to our video "Advanced connectivity troubleshooting"
by clicking the link on-screen or in the description below.