Better Ping Display [Fabric] — Minecraft Java Edition 1.15.2 - 1.21.11+

Minecraft's standard interface displays players' connection latency in the player list menu (the TAB key) as a graphical icon made up of five vertical bars. This approach does not provide precise information about connection stability, since the same icon can correspond to a latency of both 80 milliseconds and 140 milliseconds. In competitive gameplay, PvP battles, or while administering large game servers, accurate ping readings are critically important. The Better Ping Display [Fabric] modification solves this problem by replacing the abstract graphical bars with a precise numerical latency value in milliseconds directly in the player list menu.

Technical operating principle and limitations of standard latency rendering

To convey ping information, the Minecraft server sends player list update packets (in modern versions of the game this is handled by the ClientboundPlayerInfoUpdatePacket packet). Each entry in the packet contains an integer latency parameter expressed in milliseconds. The client side of the game receives this data and stores it in memory as a property of the PlayerInfo object (known in earlier versions as NetworkPlayerInfo).

While rendering the player list on screen, the vanilla interface class PlayerListHud (or PlayerTabOverlay in the Yarn mappings) iterates over all connected users and determines the latency level. Displaying the icon is handled by the internal method renderLatencyIcon (or renderPingIcon). This method compares the integer number of milliseconds against fixed thresholds:

·        A value less than 0 displays the no-connection icon (a red cross).

·        A value below 150 milliseconds corresponds to the maximum five bars.

·        The range from 150 to 299 milliseconds displays four bars.

·        The range from 300 to 599 milliseconds shows three bars.

·        The range from 600 to 999 milliseconds outputs two bars.

·        A latency of 1000 milliseconds or more displays a single bar.

In this way, the precise numerical values are discarded right before being output to the screen, and instead the corresponding sprite from the texture file icons.png is drawn.

Better Ping Display makes changes to this process using the Mixin system. The injection class modifies the behavior of PlayerListHud at the moment each player's row is drawn. The modification intercepts the call that draws the graphical bars and blocks its execution (or runs it in parallel depending on the configuration). Instead, a call is made to retrieve the exact latency value via the PlayerInfo object. The mod then passes this number to the client's text renderer Font, which dynamically draws the characters on screen, taking into account the configured style and positioning of the interface elements.

Main features: numerical display, color scale, and graphical bars

The mod expands the informativeness of the network statistics interface through the following functional capabilities:

·        Real-time numerical indicator: Displays the exact latency value in milliseconds. The player sees the actual connection state of every participant without having to hover the cursor or enter diagnostic commands in the chat.

·        Automatic color coding: By default, the modification colors the ping text depending on connection quality. Low latency (less than 100 milliseconds) is highlighted in green, medium (from 100 to 299 milliseconds) takes on a yellow or orange shade, and high latency (from 300 milliseconds and above) is colored red. This helps to instantly spot players with an unstable connection.

·        Combined display mode: The user can enable the simultaneous display of numerical values and the original vanilla ping bars. In this case, the text is drawn to the left of the graphical icon, preserving Minecraft's familiar visual style.

·        Client-side architecture: The modification works purely on the client side. It does not require installation on the server and does not send the server any additional requests. The mod reads only the traffic information that the Minecraft server transmits by default to all connected clients. Thanks to this, Better Ping Display works on any servers, including official Realms servers and public servers without mod support.

Settings, compatibility, and ecosystem

Configuring the display parameters is done by editing the betterpingdisplay.json file, which is automatically created in the config directory after the first launch of the game. The file contains the following settings:

·        autoColorPingText – a boolean flag (true/false). When set to true, the ping color changes automatically from green to red depending on the connection speed. If false is specified, the color becomes static and is determined by the next parameter.

·        pingTextColor – a text field for setting the hexadecimal color code (for example, #A0A0A0 for light gray). This color is used only when automatic color coding is disabled.

·        renderPingBars – a boolean flag that controls the rendering of the standard vanilla latency bars alongside the numerical indicator.

·        pingTextFormatString – a text formatting string. By default it is set to %dms, where the %d symbol is a mandatory technical marker that during rendering is replaced with the current number of milliseconds of latency.

In mod version 1.2.0 and later, support appeared for a graphical settings interface directly in the game menu. To access the visual configuration menu in the mod list, two additional helper components must be installed: the YetAnotherConfigLib (YACL) library and the Mod Menu mod. When they are present, a convenient window with toggles and sliders for changing Better Ping Display parameters appears in the game.

The modification is compatible with most client-side optimizers (such as Sodium, Lithium, FerriteCore) and graphical enhancements (Iris Shaders). It does not cause conflicts while playing on servers with custom player list plugins, since it changes only the local rendering stage on the client without affecting the structure of the network packets.

Conclusion

Better Ping Display [Fabric] is a compact and effective client-side modification that fixes a significant shortcoming of Minecraft's standard player list. Unlike similar solutions such as Numeral Ping or Ping Display, this mod has simple integration with the YACL library for adjusting parameters directly in the game and allows the vanilla latency icons to be preserved. The main limitation is that the refresh rate of the numbers depends on the server's own settings (by default the Minecraft server sends ping statistics updates once every few seconds, so instantaneous fluctuations in latency will not be displayed immediately). The mod is ideal for players of network modes and server administrators who need clear control over network parameters without unnecessary load on the system.