This guide shows you how to increase Internet Explorer 7’s connection limit from 2 to 16 which increases the speed of many web pages.
Want to speedup Windows Vista? Check out my guide on how to Speedup Windows Vista without Losing Functionality for more tips on speeding up Windows Vista.
What Are Connections?
When you connect to a website your computer establishes connections with the web server(s). One connection might be a graphics server, another connection may be an ad server and so on. Once the connection has received what it asked for it is disconnected and used for something else.
By default IE7 is set to only be able to open 2 or 4 connections at a time. If you have broadband and you use tabs in IE7 or you visit sites that use lots of connections this tweak will increase the speed of IE7 a little.
You might be wondering “Why don’t they just set IE7 to use 16 connections by default instead of 2?” If everyone who uses IE would use 16 connections it would slow down the internet. The low number of connections set by default is like a throttle being held back so the internet doesn’t slow down and to keep web servers from getting bogged down from many connections by only a few users.
How Do I Increase My Connections To 16?
Download and install this registry key.
If you don’t want to download and run the registry key above (I don’t blame you), you can create your own. Open notepad and paste the code below in it.
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings]
“MaxConnectionsPerServer”=dword:00000010
“MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server”=dword:0000010
Save the file by clicking save as, change Save as type to All Files, name the file something like ieregedit.reg. Don’t forget to add .reg to the file to make it a registry key.
Please note: This regkey works on IE5+ and all versions of Windows.
Don’t expect your internet speed to double or anything like that. This tweak will make most advanced sites load a little quicker. If you’re using tabs this tweak will let IE7 load multiple tabs quicker also.
Want to get faster networking in Windows Vista? Try disabling Remote Differential Compression.
Still need help? Ask Your Computer Question Now.
Explore other guides about: All • Internet Explorer • Windows.
ok, so wjhere do u save this to….. desktop?
Sure
copy text to notepad save it as a .reg file
use any name but has to besaved as .reg
Pay attention to the paragraph just under the code on this guide. It shows you how to save as a .reg file.
I just clicked the link then clicked “RUN”.
Yes.
This does not work on Vista Home Premium:(
Nice fix though:)
@JBJ The version of Windows doesn’t matter as long as you have IE5 or greater.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/282402
This works on all versions of Windows Vista.
Wow, it works! My IE7 is faster now. Thank you very much!
Best regards from Poland
Thanks a lot Brent.
Nice
my IE7 is faster.. best regards from indonesia 
WOW!!!!!!!!!! Works Great Thanks!
Thanks so much…
Seems a lot better (I think !)…I regularly have 8 tabs open
“registry editing has been disabled by your administrator.”, What is this?
um, but 14 is the default on windows ie 7?!?!?!?!?!?
i checked, using regedit. and scroll to
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings]
correct me if im wrong, maybee the “…..14(20)” in brackets may have something to do with it?
I don’t think so. Two or four connections is the standard for all browsers.
In case there is a problem, how do you set it back to the way it was?
Create your own registry file and change:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings]
“MaxConnectionsPerServer”=dword:00000010
“MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server”=dword:0000010
to:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings]
“MaxConnectionsPerServer”=dword:00000002
“MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server”=dword:0000002
to set it back the way it was.
Actually the default for “MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server” is 4.
Simply deleting the keys restores the defaults.
reg delete “HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings” /v “MaxConnectionsPerServer”
reg delete “HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings” /v “MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server”
What happens if you make it more than 10?
Does it make your browser even faster or does it crash your browser?
thanks a lot that must be very amazing tweak! do you know how to maximize internet connection by any setting from windows files because i’ve heard microsoft had taken 20% of our connection so how to solve it?
Fantastic,
IE7 was causing me to want to drop kick my pc off the roof all day.
Why the hell would they piss people off by putting this so low?
Bonehead move microsoftinthehead…
Thanks Brent!
Sometimes my explorer has a limit of pages that can be open although no error message etc. I know it can be removed because I somehow done it once before but have recently had my computer fixed and now I forget how to stop the limit….please help
thanx..impressive tweak..:P
The default on my XPx64 machine was 32, but I’ll have to check this out on all my other 32bit machines in the house.
Thanks.
These numbers on my Vista business with IE8 are 10 each.
Not sure if increasing it to 16 will improve anything.