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Optimizing Vuze (formerly Azureus) for Speed
Introduction
This guide shows how to speed up downloads in the freeware bittorrent client, Vuze. All bittorrent programs need to have their incoming and outgoing communications flow freely in order to achieve the highest download speeds and that is essentially what this guide is about.
This guide was put together using information given by the developers of bittorrent programs at their forums, guides and FAQs. There are no secret tricks, just the real basics of proper set up of a bittorrent program. Following these simple steps should result in increased download speed.
These are the basic principles of optimizing a bittorrent client, like Vuze, for speed:
- Choose a proper port to avoid ISP blocks and conflicts with other programs
- Forward that port through any software firewall and router to allow incoming connections
- Adjust internal settings based upon upload capacity of the internet connection to allow room for outgoing communications and to distribute upload efficiently.
There are some programs that claim to optimize speed in Vuze. Such programs are a scam and generally contain adware or spyware. I have seen it said, by the developers of all bittorrent programs, that nothing will increase your download speed in a bittorrent client more than the basic steps set forth herein.
Note When viewing this guide in Internet Explorer the Mac command key symbol appears as a box. I do not know why yet. Also, in IE, this guide is now showing at the bottom of the page, with the top blank. This apparently is due to the recent change in layout here, but the reason has not been determined.
This guide is applicable to all versions of Vuze (or the previous Azureus), BitTyrant and TopBT on Vuze.
If you are not using Vuze or one of the others, there are several other specific guides for other clients and a general guide here:
Optimizing Bittorrent Clients
Choosing A Proper Port
To avoid messing up a network connection that is already cleared, first check and see if your communications are blocked or are already clear. Have Vuze running when you go to test your port.
Click to Test Your Port Success-just go to Adjusting Internal Settings. Error- follow all steps.
Depending on your Mode setting, you may only see one number

If you failed the port test above, then you should first set your port to a proper one. The most important choice here is to avoid using a port within the 6881-6999 range. This was the range originally used by bittorrent programs and is often blocked by Internet Service Providers (ISPs). (If your port was in this range, change and re-test). The safest choice is a port in the 49152-65534 range as this will avoid ISP blocks and possible conflicts with other applications.
Vuze-Wiki: Port is Blacklisted
Forwarding The Port
Introduction
A router will block incoming communications unless an exception is made. All software firewalls will block incoming communications and most will also block outgoing communications, unless an exception is made. If you are "firewalled", then other people will not be able to initiate connections with you (see Why Is Being Firewalled Bad).
As there are many firewalls and routers, this guide can not give explanations as to each. However, there are guides available, on the internet for most firewalls and routers and this guide will link you to them.
Software Firewall - The permission should be set to allow TCP and UDP in both directions. Generally, you will have a choice to set permission for the Vuze port or for the Vuze program. Setting permission for the port is the safer choice. You can check these options for guides:
- The help file of your software firewall is the best place to look
- The µTorrent forum has some guides posted
- PortForward.com Firewall Guides(choose firewall and then Vuze) also has some guides.
Router - There are two choices here. The easier way is to use UPnP (NAT-PMP in Mac). However, this has a possible security issue. Using UPnP, or NAT-PMP, allows any program to create a port mapping through the router without consent of the owner. The other choice is to manually forward the port through the router. This does not have that security issue, but involves going through several steps to accomplish. Using the guides linked herein, this should not be that difficult and is the preferred method.
UPnP (NAT-PMP in Apple) - The Easy Way - Enable UPnP (NAT-PMP for Apple) in Vuze and router.
Automatically refresh mappings when NAT status is "firewalled" should also be enabled.


Manual Forwarding-The Preferred Way
- UPnP (NAT-PMP) must be disabled in Vuze (see Images above).
- Use the Static IP Guide.
-
Set permission for Vuze port. This should be set to allow both TCP and UDP communications.
You can check these options for guides:
- The help file of your router is the best place to look
- Portforward.com Azureus Router Index has guides for most routers
Click Here to Re-Test Port Success-Proceed to next step. Error- re-do steps or seek help in Forums.
Adjusting Internal Settings
Introduction
The most important setting here is to cap upload in Vuze to 80% of your overall upload capacity. Setting upload in Vuze is a fine line. The more upload you give, the more download you will get from other peers. However, if upload is set too high, or to unlimited, then download speeds will suffer as outgoing communications (acknowledgment signals, resend requests etc) will be interfered with. Other adjustments are made here to distribute your upload so that you receive back the most download from other peers.
This section of the guide is based on the Vuze-Wiki: Good Settings page.
Mode
To make sure that you can see all the options referenced here you should be in Mode = Advanced.

Speed Test: Speedtest.net (Click for Test)
First the upload capacity of your internet connection must be determined by taking an online speed test. Speedtest.net has test locations worldwide and will highlight the one closest to you.
To take the test you must have Flash installed and javascript enabled.
Before taking the speed test, press Settings in the upper right of the speedtest.net page. This will take you to another page. At the bottom of that page is the "Global Settings" options. Set "Speed Measurement" to kilobytes and press "Save" . This will facilitate entry into the calculator below and will lessen confusion as qBittorrent shows speeds in kilobytes.



You should stop all internet activity, including torrents, before taking the test and the test should be taken a few times to obtain a reliable average. Results will now show in KiloBytes. It is the upload rate that is important here.

Another Way To Test Upload Speed
For most people these test results will be reliable (Comcast users see Note). However, you may wish to do a double check on real life upload speed. When you are seeding a torrent with a good number of peers and you are using your upload cap, set upload to unlimited and watch for about 5-10 minutes and see where upload settles in at. Then input that number into the calculator in the kiloBytes section.
Note: Some ISPs will show inaccurate results on the speed test. If your ISP has anything like Comcast's PowerBoost, then your results will show higher than the actual speed of your connection. PowerBoost provides a burst of download and upload speeds above your provisioned download and upload speeds for the first 10MB and 5MB respectively. Since the speed test involves relatively small files, this will skew results upward.
If you have PowerBoost, or something similar, my findings from my own results and those of others is that the actual speeds are 60% of the test result. So if you get 200kB/s for upload at the test, you should enter 120 in the kB/s box in the calculator. Using Google ("speed result" x .6) will get the proper number to enter in the calculator and this actually turns out to be very accurate. You should end up with the calculator showing a cap that is about half of the test result.
Calculator: Azureus Upload Settings Calculator
Once you have an average upload speed for your connection go to the online Azureus Upload Settings Calculator. Although designed for Azureus, this calculator will work for all bittorrent clients.
This calculator was created by the8472 a contributor to Vuze (fka Azureus) and part of the team that created Bittorrent Protocol Encryption.
Enter your average upload speed in the appropriate box

The calculator will automatically give the proper figures to adjust various options in µTorrent.

Input Results Into Vuze - Screen shots of locations in Vuze of settings to be adjusted


Peer Sources & Encryption
Having the proper peer sources enabled, such as Peer Exchange (PEX) and Distributed Hash Table (DHT), will help download speeds as they will help you find additional seeds and peers for a torrent.
Encryption was primarily designed to thwart Internet Service Providers interference with bittorrent. Having encryption enabled and allowing incoming legacy (non-encrypted) connections will provide you with the largest pool of seeds/peers to select from.
The settings for peer sources are at Tools>Options>Connection and should be set as in the below image:

The settings for encryption are at Tools>Options>Connection>Transport Encryption. The settings shown in the image below will provide the highest encryption level and still allow connection with the most seeds/peers:

Good Torrents
The general rule here is to choose torrents that have a high seed to peer ratio. Seeds have 100% of the content associated with the torrent and are only uploading to peers. Peers also upload to other peers, but are also looking for other peers to upload to themselves and their download capacity is almost always higher than their upload capacity.
This applies even though one swarm has significantly more active users than another. For example, a torrent with 30 seeders and 70 peers (30% seeders) will generally be faster than one with 500 seeders and 2500 peers (20% seeders) as the average upload capacity available to the peers will be higher. (TorrentFreak).
For more information see Good Torrents
Related Articles
- Additional Vuze Settings Help with ISP interference and other options
- Searching for Torrents Popular and unique torrent search sites, with comments.
- Finding Legal (and Free) Torrents sites that offer only legally downloadable and distributable content.
Gizmo's Best Ever Freeware Forums
If you still have issues after using this guide and would like some assistance, you may post here or our Forums. The comments section here is not well set up for ongoing discussions, so the forums are a better place.
When posting on a speed issue, please provide
- Your speed test result for both upload and download speed in kiloBytes per second (kBps)
- Your result at canyouseeme, both before taking any steps and after. Just indicate Success or Error do not post your IP address.
If you have a suggestion or correction for the guide, please post here.
Those who wish to post a thanks may post here or in the forums. I always appreciate hearing from those who this helped and I do read the posts regularly. I used to respond to each thanks, but realized it was clogging up the comments section. I thank all those who have posted their appreciation and all those who will.
So, to those who post a "Thanks", I appreciate it.
Steve
- Article type:
Comments
Hello again Mr6n8 :)
I really appreciated this guide.. very helpful. One concern I have is that my port test showed Stealth, not Open.. so I am assuming I am being blocked by Firewall (whatever that entirely means).. how do I change this?
thx again Steve, great work!
Maggie
*edit:
I do see the green smilie next to the current DLs.. so now I am confused about the lack of open port but the green smilie indicating that it is working. ??
If you see the green smileys, then I would suggest not doing anything yet.
I have been meaning to amend this guide for users to test port using Help>Nat/Firewall test within Vuze. You could try that and see what happens.
Steve
yeah, thanks.. I've figured out since my last visit here that my port is 'open'. (or at least I think so). I may try the Help>Nat/Firewall test within Vuze as you suggest..
But I think I'm good. I've learned alot in vuze in the past couple of days; thx Steve. +1 :D
Cheers,
Maggie~
This is incredible advice! This got my download speed up to 1.5 MB/s !!!!!!!
that is great
i don"t know what to do in Manual Forwarding in chapter 2 Use the Static IP Guide,what should i suposte to do??somone can help me to do this in the easiest way???
I am not sure where your issue is, but I do not think I could make setting a Static IP clearer than the guide at portforward as they have images etc., to help.
Although there is a slight security risk increase, I would suggest just using UPnP as that will get you set up quicker and easier. The security risk is not that much and if you are having issues with the Static IP just go with UPnP.
Steve
My router is Prolink WNR1008. Can someone help me please?
I could not find a guide at Portforward.
However, I did find the user's manual for that model.
It is a pdf, so I can not link to it-just substitute . for [dot]
http://www.prolink2u[dot]com/download/um/um_WNR1008_ver1.00_02.12.2010.pdf
Check page 8 for the login IP and default name and password to get to configuration.
Page 29 for port filtering. Check your Vuze for the port used (as set forth in the guide above) and set exception for that port for both TCP and UDP.
Cant seem to work it for my Mac OSX 10.6. I couldn't get the proper port and set a proper static IP for my laptop using only the internet from a 3G broadband plugged into a router. what can i do to fix this?
I do not know what you mean by "get the proper port".
You choose the port (preferably using the range referred to above) and clear by setting an exception for the port in any firewall, software or hardware, on your system.
As to the static IP, I saw some guides for 10.6, but they were for specific institutions and may confuse you.
However, in comparing those to the static IP guide at portforward for 10.4 it looks to be almost the same set up
http://portforward.com/networking/static-Mac10.4.htm
speed went from 880b/s to 15kb/s. download estimation was reduced from 42years to 18days. Mood = HAPPINESS. sigh for bad ISP!! curse you ISP cheat!!
thanks now I am getting download speeds of 1.84MB/s
Brilliant! It worked for me although it didn't seem to work straight away for some reason but it's nice and fast now :]
Thank you so much!
Nice tutorial. I've been using these settings for about 5 years, and I also found the Vuze Extreme Mod with more options. This doesn't talk about running proxies or tor, but that might be over some noobs heads. You run data encryption, but allow people who can't handle that option to connect without data encryption??? Why use it then? IP Filter??? That is a simple fix, and it stops corporations from poisoning your download with packet injections. People need to learn this stuff if they are going to download.
Again I will say nice tutorial. Basic but good.
Setting encryption on,but allowing incoming non-encrypted gets the most available seeds/peers to be able to connect.
Many users who do not have encryption set, will switch to encrypted once connected to your client. in any event, the guide is about best speed and connecting to the most seeds/peers is part of that.
"Encryption only" should be used when an ISP is interfering.
Info on IPFilter is in the Additional Vuze Settings page.
Proxies have their own set of rules, so hard to make a comprehensive guide.
Tor should only be used to make connections. Using bittorrent for downloading on Tor puts a stress on the Tor system and Tor requests that it not be done.
The guide is intended to be a collection of the basic information that is available at the sites of bittorrent clients. It hopefully lays it out in a easy to understand fashion.
Steve
dont works bro....
What problems did you get? What did not work? Mind giving some details?
amazing! i was DLing a blu ray and it went from 2 days 5 hours. thanks!
WOW thanks! My download speed got more than 5 times higher.
BTW I'm in a hotel right now so will me using their internet to download BIG,BIG,REALLY BIG movies slow it down for others? Oh well
i know its dumb but the port your talking is the incoming TCP listen port if it is so what should be the best port number to use? when i use canyouseeme its asking the port so i use the TCP listen port. what i did is correct or wrong if its is correct im still getting and error my speed test range to Download 161.7kilo bytes/s and UPload 112.7
17Mb/s Internet Connection... Usual download speeds on Steam etc 2 to 3Mb/s
Downloading from Vuze at 17kb/s... even after all that jazz above.
WTF? Please say i have missed something flipping obvious!
Thanks for a great guide!
Quick question ( and probably a dumb one), do these settings mess up any connections or process on my computer. It just seems so technical to me and I just want to make sure I'm not abusing my machine (other than getting the best speed for my torrents.)
No they will not mess things up.
These settings will make it so Vuze will work with other programs better.
Steve
I have a good internet speed, i do the speed check and the download speed is usually 160-200 kb/s, and when i open Vuze my download speed never goes above 15 kb/s, and that is rarely, usually only lasting a couple seconds, then it goes back to 3 or 4 kb/s and somtimes as low as 100 b/s. Yesterday, i had speeds of 150 Kb/s then later that day they went down to what they are now. please help i have changed the port # to an unused one. I live in ecuador, on the list of bad servers i did not find mine which is Tv cable, thanks beforehand
do you upload alot?? trackers could have you blacklisted if you always download but never upload,that would make you a leecher and account for your bad download speeds.
check your share ratio!--plugins&extras..transfers..total ratio...at least let it be above 0.8....if it isnt leave your pc uploading till it gets there.
Have you tried the guide above?
If not, you should.
If so, what was your result on the port test?
And, what was your speed test result for upload and download speed?
And, what did you cap upload in Vuze at?
I did not find much about TV Cable-which plan are you on?
Also, watch the bs when you are stating speeds.
B = bytes b = bits 8b = 1B so that is a big difference.
Vuze shows speeds in bytes and ISPs advertise speed in bits.
Steve
everything went to great and i have 5mb download speed on speed test, but im still only getting max 30kb/s
Not sure what everything went to great means.
What was your result at canyouseeme? Just indicate Success or Error do not post your IP address.
What was your result for upload at the speed test (in bytes "B") and what did you cap upload in Vuze at?
Steve
Hi - thanks for the info!
I've tried using the steps you outlined in your guide (which is fantastic, by the way) but i'm still stuck on 30kB/s or so. I used to be able to get over 150 but now even speedtest.net won't show download speeds above 45kB/s.
Is it possible that my ISP has done something to limit my download speed?
Thanks for your advice! :)
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