The available bandwidth of a communication path between two nodes of a computer network is determined using probe packages that are transmitted between a sender one of the nodes and a receiver one of the nodes at varying transmission rates. Each successive transmission rate of the probe packages is selected according to: (i) an achieved throughput for a transmission of a preceding one of the probe packages, and (ii) a deviation between the achieved throughput for the transmission of the preceding one of the probe packages and a corresponding transmission rate of the preceding one of the probe packages.