Abstract: In certain embodiments, a source node in a communication network transmits a so-called hopstamp packet to a destination node, which re-transmits the hopstamp packet back to the source node to complete a round-trip path for the hopstamp packet. Each hop along the round-trip path populates a corresponding hopstamp field with at least the identity of the hop and the time delay between the hop receiving the hopstamp packet from the previous node of the round-trip path and the hop transmitting the hopstamp packet to the next node of the round-trip path. When the hopstamp packet arrives back at the source node, the populated hopstamp fields will identify at least the traceroute for the round-trip path and the time delay for each of hops in the round-trip path. This hop-level latency information can then be used to control the routing of data in the network.