Packets Per Second / Line Rate Calculator

How it works

Packets per second = MAC bits per second ÷ ((frame bytes + 8 + 12) × 8). The extra 20 bytes represent preamble/SFD and interframe gap in wire-time units.

Worked example

At 1 Gbps, 64-byte frames consume 84 byte-times each, giving approximately 1,488,095 packets per second. The gap consumes time but is not part of the frame.

Inputs, edge cases & common mistakes

Include the four-byte FCS in your frame input. Use the Ethernet MAC rate, not the encoded PHY symbol rate. This constant-size model excludes PHY coding, FEC and scheduling details. Jumbo acceptance depends on every device along the path.

Technical references

• RFC 1242
• RFC 2544
• Cisco Ethernet wire-time overhead

Reviewed 9 September 2026. Found an issue? Send a correction with a reproducible example.