Fix slow Wi-FI with this router settings tweak - waldensheophy83

Sometimes a little software adjustment is complete it takes to fix your Wi-Fi problems.

I realized this much when I bought a brand-new router, a hulking monster with support for the latest Wi-Fi 6 touchstone. What should feature been a major mesh upgrade as an alternative become a hair-pull experience as I tested to figure prohibited why its download speeds were so unreliable.

It turns out the solution was simple: Just variety the router's convey and bandwidth settings to avoid potential sources of interference.

Out of the box, virtually routers will select a control channel mechanically. I assumptive this would be fine because I'm in a suburb without a good deal of other Wi-Fi networks nearby. Interference can buoy come from a lot of sources, however, and your router's default selection might non be the best. With a bit of trial and error, I found a channel that gets me close to wired ethernet speeds from pretty much anywhere in the house.

The way to change your channel and bandwidth settings varies by router manufacturer, but you can either try visiting 192.168.1.1 in your web browser or viewing your manufacturer's living pages. (Here are just about for Asus, TP-Data link, Netgear, and Linksys.)

As for which channel to pick, Android users can check out an app called Wi-Fi Analyser to scan for potential congestion sources connected to each one channel, but I've found that IT's record-breaking to fair experiment. If you have a dual-band router, you can try any channel on the 5GHz banding, but for the 2.4GHz band, stick to channels 1, 6, or 11 if possible.

You can also try selecting 20MHz-channel bandwidth on the 2.4GHz band, which can promote reduce interference at a small cost to focal ratio. In my case, that made a big difference every bit well. (If any of this sounds intimidating, compose down or take a mental picture if your current settings before you start making changes, so you can transfer them spinal column if anything goes wrong.)

wifiroutersettings — Changing your Wi-Fi channel and bandwidth can make a sizeable remainder.

Once you've selected a channel, try running some speed tests on whatever devices are giving you trouble. Netflix's Secured.com is a handy speed test tool you backside visit in any browser, even connected your phone, surgery you can just search Google for the give voice "amphetamine test" and hit the blue "Focal ratio Mental testing' push at the top of the results. Stick to whatever channel gives you consistent speeds crosswise multiple tests.

A Holy Writ of warning, though: While tweaking your Wi-Fi transmission channel might aid with inconsistent speeds, it South Korean won't as if by magic give your router better range operating theater eliminate dead zones. If your speeds are dropping bump off as you get farther away from the router, it power be time for a new router or range extender instead.

This column originally appeared in Advisorator, Jared's weekly newsletter for helping folks make sense of engineering science. Sign capable get on tips sent uncoiled to your inbox (hopefully without some Wi-Fi issues along the way).