Calling all WiFi Experts: How can I get good wireless coverage in very big 2-story house?

My Ex set up a network with a router and an extension because the Wi-Fi didn’t reach the bedroom. The extension wasn’t great either. I have a new faster router but I have to go into the hall with my device for it to see the network and then it works in my bedroom.

Not a very technical answer but sending sympathy.

A large powerful router (Netgear R7000 or R8000) will do the trick.

However, wifi repeaters (there are lots to choose from) are very good as well.

To some degree it depends on the width of the walls, what they’re made of (concrete, wood, Aluminum studs?), and other interference (other nearby houses).

If the house is being built for you, I’d ask the builder to put Cat5E or cat6 cabling to each room, and you could have a wired connection terminating someplace where you would put a wireless base station. If it’s an existing home, that’s not an option.

My dad used a wifi extender (and still does) – works wonderfully.

My two cents: the extender will give you better overall coverage.

We have a long house and the signal has to go through multiple walls. We bought the best router we could and we have a booster thing too. To a degree, it depends on the quality of the network (I know I’m using the wrong terms here, but I don’t know the right terms). We used to have a great internet connection, but as more and more homes have been added to our exchange, the signal has become less and less efficient – especially at busy times. So beyond the best quality router and booster, I’ll be watching your question for other ideas too.

Get an access point/range extender

I had 5,000 sq ft (2 story) and had no trouble. Mine was an old Netgear. I also had that same unit in my 4,000 sq. Ft. one story.

I believe you can buy a box that plugs your router in to your homes electricity supply so you can connect to the internet through any electrical socket in your house.

2.4Ghz has better range and goes through walls better than 5Ghz.

Turn off the 5Ghz on the router. 5Ghz also drains phone batteries faster.

That Netgear EX3700 linked above by @ARE_you_kidding_me is a good one. You can connect it to the router wirelessly or wired (wired is better, if you can run an Ethernet cable).

Thanks, all. Great info.

You need to do your own wireless site survey since every environment is different. Variables that impact wireless range and speed are building materials, active user density, RF – electromagnetic interference or CCI – Co-channel interference

A repeater or an extender degrades your bandwidth since it has to use it to communicate with the main wireless source and the clients. They do extend the range but they also bounce back all the router’s traffic, creating congestion and slowing the network. I recommend access points instead.

The wifi capability built in routers is inferior to access points. 2-in-1 of any product is generally inferior. What you can do is buy a router without wifi capability and compliment it with an access point which will be your main source for wifi. I did that but with an enterprise grade router and access point. I found consumer grade to be insufficient.

In the newest models, the average sq ft coverage of a single enterprise access point using ac standard at 5ghz is around 4,000–5,000 sq ft.

As a frame of reference for you, I live in a 2-family house on a property of around 4 acres – 174,000 sq ft. There is an abundance of CCI in the area. Building material is concrete and steel with around 60 active clients streaming high quality videos. I’m using a bunch of Ruckus ZoneFlex R710 access points which have the latest ac wave 2 wifi standard. A single R710 covers around 5,000 sq ft for me.

I have two internet providers for backup incase one goes down, so I needed a dual wan, loading balancing router. I use this one Peplink Balance One Core Load Balancing Router

If this is too pricey for you and you only have one internet provider, then you can try the following cheaper alternatives which are still considered enterprise grade. Single wan router – Ubiquiti Edgerouter PoE and one of these access points Ubiquiti Networks UAP-AC-PRO. That is the highest wifi model and from the same company these are the lower models, Ubiquiti UAP-AC-LR and the lowest UAP-AC-LITE

If more than one access point is used, you have to make sure they’re not sharing the same channels and the best place to position them is mounting it on the ceiling.

I provided the wrong link for the Ubiquiti Pro model. Here is the correct link Ubiquiti Networks UAP-AC-PRO

I think only the Pro model is 3×3 mimo. The others are 2×2 and the latest is 4×4 which is a substantial difference but isn’t offered yet by Ubiquiti. Something to consider if you’re not in a rush. I think Ubi is pushing 4×4 mimo sometime in 2017.