An Australian spider is officially the fastest in the world, ending a decades-old debate and causing cold sweats for arachnophobes.

With a top speed of almost 3.6 metres a second, Queensland’s brown huntsman is the world’s quickest, according to a new lab study.

The Moroccan flic-flac spider was previously considered to be the world’s fastest with a speed of almost 1.7 metres per second, but some experts didn’t agree that this is a type of sprinting locomotion.

To settle the debate, researchers from the Imperial College London and Germany’s University of Greifswald conducted a lab test with more than 160 live spider species from across Britain, Australia, North America, and southern Europe.

The tests also included dozens of spiders sourced from pet shops.

“We measured maximum sustained running speed for 236 specimens representing 162 species,” researchers wrote in a yet-to-be peer-reviewed study posted in bioaRxiv.

“To maximise coverage, we supplemented these measurements with published data for a further 96 species.”

Each spider was individually weighed and tested for top speeds on A4 and A3 grid papers, with cameras monitoring the tests to study the biomechanics of their movements.

The papers were mounted on a plastic tray or metal sheet, with greased walls to stop climbing species from escaping.

The huntsman spider, sourced from Queensland, was the fastest of them all, reaching a top speed of 3.59 metres a second.

Huntsman spiders, although generally harmless to humans, have an international reputation thanks to social media.

Multiple online videos depict the large, hairy spiders popping up in unlikely places – like car sun visors – as well as eating unlikely things, including birds and even a young possum.

The brown huntsman – which is about the size of a human hand – lives along Australia’s east coast and is a common sight in homes in south-east Queensland.

While they are venomous, a rare huntsman spider bite has only a mild affect on humans.

While for many people the news that one of the scariest-looking spiders is also one of the fastest is nightmare fuel, study author Clemente said its top speed lasted only a fraction of a second.

He said the huntsman’s average sustained speed was closer to two meters a second – which seems only mildly reassuring.

“That’s still really fast,” he said.