Wi-Upgrade Wi-Fi?

With so many devices relying on wireless networking these days, having an up-to-date home network is a must. That’s because many previous-gen routers simply aren’t up to the task of supporting multiple high-speed devices. While it may be tempting to leave well enough alone once a network is up and running, a lot has changed in terms of broadband service and home WiFi demands over the past few years.

Simply put, if you have high-bandwidth requirements, such as 4K streaming, video conferencing, or game streaming, it’s probably time for an upgrade. The same is true if you have multiple smart devices in the home, such as smart speakers or a security system. In short, there’s plenty of new networking technology to take advantage of, and it will be put to good use in the modern home environment.

What’s With All the WiFi Standards?

For the Fall 2024 edition of this guide, we list products from three generations: 802.11ac (WiFi 5), 802.11ax (WiFi 6/6E), and 802.11be (WiFi 7). All have their place (and their pricepoint), and we’ll walk you through the benefits of each. To kick things off, we’ll just say that the cheapest (and slowest) is WiFi 5, but it’s still plenty fast if you’re on a lower-tier Internet service provider (say under 100Mbps), and the price makes it a very easy purchase.

Moving on, we have 802.11ax, which was given the friendlier WiFi 6 name, and a later iteration was called 802.11axe/WiFi 6E. The simplified numerical branding was intended to help consumers know what they were getting (and WiFi 5 was retroactively applied to older 11ac products, despite the name being introduced many years later). The thought was that consumers couldn’t keep track of whether 802.11n, 802.11ac, 802.11ax was faster (although 802.11ax certainly sounded cooler!). In case you’re wondering, the mid-generation WiFi 6E unlocked extra performance by using the 6GHz band (all previous WiFi standards used 2.4GHz or 5GHz). It’s a bit confusing that WiFi 6 doesn’t use 6GHz and only WiFi 6E does, but in truth 6E wasn’t fully embraced by manufacturers, and we never recommended it.

At this point, if you want serious speed, you go next-gen: 802.11be/WiFi 7. It adds the 320MHz channel on top of the existing 6GHz band from WiFi 6E, which is confusing but translates to one thing… speed! How much speed do you ask? Well, while 6E topped out at 4800Mbps, 7 can hit 11500Mbps, or nearly 2.5x faster. That is simply mind-blowing, and you know you want it. But… be forewarned: WiFi 7 is strictly for early adopters, given the cost and the fact that very few client devices (i.e., your wireless gear) use WiFi 7. But if building a network for the future is your goal, WiFi 7 is what you need.

Speaking of client devices, if you’re a desktop PC user as many of our readers are, you have the option of upgrading your WiFi, including to WiFi 6 or even 7 with a PCIe-based adapter, which we list in this guide. There’s now even a USB option for WiFi 6E, which means you can update older laptops, although it is a bit bulky. You can learn more later in this guide.

One last thing: you’ll need fast Internet service to take advantage of the speed of any of the offerings in our guide, and that means cable or fiberoptic. The latter always has proprietary modems, but for cable you can buy your own cable modem, and we offer our recommendation in this guide, getting you out of paying monthly rental fees, while getting you into true Gigabit broadband service!

What If I’m Tired of Dropping the Signal Across My Home?

If you have a medium to larger home (say, over 2000 sq. ft.), speed ratings won’t tell you all you need to know about network performance. This is when it’s time to think beyond a single router (or node) sitting on one side of your house, and move to multi-node “mesh” network!

A system like the Netgear Orbi pictured here will fill those dead spots faster than you can say “where’s my signal?!?” With that said, gamers and streamers living in apartments and small homes should probably go with a single high-powered router at the same pricepoint. You get more straight-line speed at the expense of range. And anyone who wants the best of all worlds can actually pair two Asus-branded routers using the innovative Asus AIMesh system to create a truly out-of-this-world mesh network that has extreme speed and extreme range!

One last thing: we utilize Amazon links throughout this guide, and your use of these links helps support future development of the guide!