Low latency solutions

Real-Time – Direct

Achieve speed, scale and consistency with our fully managed, premium low latency market data service. Access full-depth, exchange-sourced feeds while LSEG manages the complete technology stack.

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  1. Overview
  2. Features & benefits
  3. Key use cases
  4. Insights
  5. Faqs
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Move faster, operate with confidence, and scale your trading and analytics workflows

Identifying opportunities across the trading lifecycle requires more than just speed. Today's use cases demand high-quality, trusted data – delivered with the performance, resilience and operational support required to meet evolving business requirements.

Real-Time – Direct is a fully managed, premium low latency market data solution, providing access to multiple full-depth, direct, exchange-sourced feeds without the complexity of building and maintaining feed handler infrastructure in-house.

LSEG manages the complete technology stack, including hardware, software, monitoring, exchange-driven changes, maintenance and operational support. With extensive global venue coverage, a normalised LSEG data model, standardised symbology and a unified API framework consistent across LSEG Real-Time solutions, Real-Time – Direct delivers a fast, comprehensive view of financial markets while simplifying integration into existing workflows.

Available through shared hosted, dedicated hosted and customer-deployed deployment models, firms can focus on consuming market data rather than managing the underlying infrastructure, while benefiting from latency transparency and performance reporting to support trading, operational and regulatory requirements.

For ultra-low latency access to exchange-native feeds, we also offer Real-Time – Ultra Direct which provides highly optimised feed handlers with single-digit microsecond processing, supporting both native and normalised data formats.

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Features & benefits

Extensive, high-quality coverage – delivered at speed

Access full-depth, global exchange-sourced data with strong latency performance and minimal jitter. For supported venues, 99.99% of updates delivered within 50 microseconds (ingress to egress), with latency as low as 30 microseconds on multiple venues.

Consistent data model and seamless integration

Access low latency market data enriched with corporate actions, derived fields, exchange corrections, reference data and more. Delivered through a normalised LSEG data model, standardised symbology and unified API framework, Real-Time – Direct integrates seamlessly across existing LSEG Real-Time applications and workflows.

Fully managed, flexible deployment

Reduce operational complexity with a fully managed service covering hardware, software, monitoring, exchange-driven updates, onboarding and ongoing maintenance. Regional experts provide technical and content support, helping firms focus on leveraging market data rather than operating it.

Dedicated testing environments

Preview releases, validate new content and test changes before production rollout using dedicated test and weekend environments. Support for exchange-specific testing environments helps reduce implementation risk and supports smoother deployments.

Customer-controlled maintenance scheduling

Align software updates and maintenance with your operational requirements. Flexible scheduling provides greater control over maintenance windows and supports customer-specific operational and risk management processes.

Transparency & resilience

Built on LSEG’s global infrastructure, with high availability, robust resilience, and access to latency metrics to support operational and regulatory requirements.

Key use cases

Powering your trading and analytics workflows

  • Automated and algorithmic trading: Support faster decision-making and improve strategy performance with low latency market data.
  • Market making & pricing models: Enhance fair value estimation, quoting behaviour and intraday pricing accuracy across dynamic market conditions.
  • Execution modelling & optimisation: Refine algorithms, smart order routing and venue selection frameworks to support more efficient trade execution.
  • High-touch (sell-side OMS) and low-touch direct market access (DMA) trading: Support more informed trading decisions with low latency access to exchange-sourced market data.

Insights

The new low latency equation: Speed, scale, and certainty

Explore how low latency strategies are being redefined by data scale, cloud delivery, and advanced capture technologies. In this article with The Trade, we uncover why speed alone is no longer enough to compete in today’s increasingly complex, data-driven global markets.
Download Read the article
PDF • 1.7MB

Market data normalisation for low latency environments: Addressing fragmentation challenges at scale

Fragmented market data continues to create hidden cost, risk and operational complexity in trading. In this expert talk we explore how firms are tackling market data fragmentation – and why LSEG treats a robust normalisation layer as core infrastructure rather than a downstream transformation step.
Download Read the expert talk
PDF • 590.1KB

FAQs

    • Direct feeds are full-tick, full-depth, market data feeds connected directly to exchanges and delivered to your applications with no conflation. They are designed to provide data as quickly as possible, with minimal processing, enabling low latency access to exchange data.
    • A managed direct feed reduces the operational complexity of capturing, normalising, maintaining and updating market data feeds.
    • By managing software updates, hardware monitoring and exchange-driven changes, a managed service can help reduce operational overhead and accelerate time to market, allowing firms to access high-quality, low latency data without the need to build and operate feed handler infrastructure.
    • Real-Time – Direct eliminates the need to build, maintain and update feed handler infrastructure internally, while reducing the overhead associated with tracking exchange-driven changes.
    • LSEG manages the complete technology stack, including hardware, software, monitoring, exchange-driven changes, maintenance and operational support, allowing firms to focus on consuming market data rather than managing the underlying infrastructure.
    • Data is delivered in a normalised, consistent format using LSEG data models and symbology. This enables firms to work across multiple feeds and venues more easily, without needing to standardise raw exchange data internally.
    • Yes. Real-Time – Direct is designed to integrate with existing trading, analytics and data distribution workflows. A normalised LSEG data model, standardised symbology and unified API framework help simplify integration across LSEG’s real-time ecosystem.
    • Real-Time – Direct delivers low latency market data, with 99.99% of updates delivered in as little as 50 microseconds ingress to egress for supported venues.
    • Real-Time – Direct provides fully managed access to direct, exchange-sourced feeds, with 99.99% of updates delivered in as little as 50 microseconds, from ingress to egress.
    • Real-Time – Ultra Direct provides feed handler libraries, enabling firms to capture and process exchange data directly, with latency measured in single-digit microseconds.
    • Real-Time – Direct is designed for firms that require low latency, exchange-sourced data delivered as a fully managed service, without the complexity of building and maintaining feed handlers.
    • Real-Time – Ultra Direct is suited to firms requiring ultra-low latency and complete control over data capture and processing, including the ability to work with exchange-native feeds directly.
    • Customers contract directly with exchanges for connectivity and market data licences. LSEG does not administer exchange fees or permissioning, allowing firms to retain ownership and control of their data.
    • Real-Time – Direct is available through three deployment models:
      1. Shared hosted – Delivered through LSEG's Real-Time Managed Distribution Service, providing low latency access via cross-connects or circuits.
      2. Dedicated hosted – Dedicated infrastructure providing the lowest-latency access via cross-connects.
      3. Customer-deployed – LSEG-managed infrastructure within your environment, with LSEG providing hardware, software maintenance and local expert support.
    • In all deployment models, customers maintain direct relationships with exchanges for connectivity and market data licensing while LSEG manages the technology stack and operational support.
    • Real-Time – Direct can be deployed within your own environment as a fully managed service.
    • LSEG provides and maintains the infrastructure and software remotely, with 24/7 monitoring and support, while you retain control over exchange connectivity and data licences.
    • Real-Time – Direct offers expanded US equities coverage via a hosted, direct-connect service, providing low latency connectivity across key US trading venues.
    • Real-Time – Direct provides access to OPRA options market data, covering full tick trade and quote data across US options markets. 
    • The service delivers high-volume options data through a low latency, hosted platform, using LSEG data models and symbology for consistency and integration.
    • Real-Time – Direct offering covers major APAC venues by trading volume such as, China, Japan, Hong Kong, India, Australia, Korea and Taiwan.

Related solutions

Find out more about related LSEG solutions

Real-Time – Ultra Direct

Unlock direct access to exchange-native feeds with our ultra-low latency software feed handler library – delivering single-digit microsecond processing.

Real-Time Managed Distribution Service

Simplify market data management with our fully managed, cloud-ready distribution service – delivering speed, resilience and global reach.

Real-Time data solutions

Our Real-Time solutions provide comprehensive, high-quality coverage of over 90 million instruments – powering trading, risk management, compliance, and post-trade operations across front, middle, and back offices.

Real-Time Distribution System

Distribute, manage and govern real-time market data across your organisation with confidence. Support trading, analytics and downstream workflows through flexible APIs and centralised entitlements management.

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