Mouse Polling Rate Test
Move your mouse to estimate how many times per second it reports its position.
Move your mouse quickly inside this box.
Current
0 Hz
Maximum
0 Hz
Events
0
Browsers cap mouse events at the display refresh rate in some cases, so treat this as an estimate.
Your test runs locally in your browser. No device data is uploaded.
How to use the mouse polling rate test
Move the cursor quickly and continuously inside the box for a few seconds. The maximum value is the closest estimate of your polling rate.
What this test checks
Polling rate is how often your mouse sends position updates, measured in hertz. Office mice usually report at 125 Hz, while gaming mice run at 500, 1000 Hz or higher.
The browser can only measure the events it receives, and it may batch them to the display refresh rate. Readings are therefore an estimate, not a lab measurement.
Move continuously: slow movement produces fewer events and a lower reading.
Common mouse polling rate problems
A reading far below your mouse's rating can mean a USB hub bottleneck, a driver setting or power saving on the port.
Frequently asked questions
- What is polling rate?
- How many times per second your mouse reports its position, measured in hertz. 125 Hz means a report every 8 ms; 1000 Hz means one every millisecond. It sets the ceiling on how quickly movement can reach the screen, which is why it is quoted so heavily for gaming mice.
- Why is my measured rate lower than the rate my mouse advertises?
- The browser can only count the movement events it receives, and several things below it can reduce that number: the operating system coalescing events, a busy page, a low display refresh rate, or power saving on a laptop. Treat a slightly low reading as normal and a dramatically low one as worth investigating.
- How should I move the mouse while testing?
- Keep moving continuously and at a moderate speed for a few seconds. The test can only count reports while the mouse is actually moving, so a stationary or barely moving mouse produces a meaningless number.
- Does a higher polling rate make a mouse better?
- Only up to a point. Going from 125 Hz to 500 Hz removes latency most people can feel; beyond 1000 Hz the difference is far smaller than marketing suggests, and very high rates raise CPU usage. It matters most alongside a high refresh rate display.