pathping

A Windows tool that combines ping and traceroute to measure per-hop latency and packet loss.

Pathping is a Windows command-line utility that merges ping and traceroute into one diagnostic session. It first maps the route to the destination (like traceroute), then sends repeated ICMP echo requests to each hop, computing per-hop round-trip latency and packet-loss percentages over a sampling period (about 25 seconds per hop by default).

The key exam distinction is that traceroute (tracert) reveals only the path and approximate latency in a single pass, while pathping exposes sustained packet loss at intermediate routers — useful for isolating a flaky WAN link that passes a quick ping but drops traffic under load.

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