Ritsu is slow or laggy

If Ritsu feels slow, the cause is usually one of: peak-hour load on the AI provider, a too-large PoK / source context, browser tab pressure, or your network. Here's the triage.

Quick checks

Peak hours

AI provider latency spikes during US/EU office hours (roughly 14:00-22:00 UTC). A response that streams in 8 seconds at 03:00 UTC might take 30 seconds at peak. Not a Ritsu bug — model providers throttle. Workarounds:

• Wait it out — peak passes within hours
• For Pro users: priority routing kicks in, you'll feel less slowdown but still some

Large context

If your PoK is built on a 500-page source and you ask /explain to summarise the whole thing, Ritsu has to feed all of it to the model — which takes time + tokens.

Symptom: first response after switching to a new PoK is slow; subsequent responses are fast.

Workarounds:

• Use smaller, more focused PoKs (a chapter, not the whole book)
• Use /search first to find relevant sections, then /explain scoped to those
• Run /summarize once to get a fast overview, then dive into specific parts

Browser tabs

If you have 30 tabs open, your browser may be context-switching aggressively. Streaming connections compete for CPU.

Workaround: close tabs you're not using. Or use a fresh browser window for Ritsu.

Slow network

Streaming connections are sensitive to network jitter. A 4G connection on a moving train will feel choppy even if total throughput is fine.

Workaround: switch to Wi-Fi if you can. If the issue persists on stable Wi-Fi, see Chat won't load or respond.

Specific symptoms

Streaming starts fast, then slows mid-response

Usually a network jitter issue. The first chunks come through fast (in a buffer), then real-time pace catches up. Refresh and retry on a more stable network.

Always slow regardless of time of day

Could be your network. Run a speed test (fast.com). If <2 Mbps stable, that's the problem.

If your network is fast but Ritsu is consistently slow, email support@ritsu.ai with:

• Your timezone + a few timestamps when it was slow
• Speed-test result
• The PoK size if known (bigger PoK = bigger context)

Quiz / flashcard generation is slow

Generation tasks are heavier than chat — they involve more model passes. Expect 10-30 seconds for a 5-question quiz, 20-60 seconds for a 10-card flashcard deck. If it's much longer than that, retry — sometimes the first generation hits a slow path that doesn't repeat.

Saving a deck is slow

Network upload of the rendered deck. Usually <2 seconds. If it spins forever, refresh and retry. Saved progress isn't lost.

Will upgrading make it faster?

Paid plans add monthly credits and higher source limits — what each plan includes is on the pricing page. If responses are consistently slow on any plan, tell us (see below) so we can look at the provider side.

Still slow?

Email support@ritsu.ai with timestamps + a sample slow query. We can correlate to provider-side latency in our metrics.