Which wireless extender

You can also set up and monitor your extended network with TP-Link's handy Tether app, which puts advanced settings and security tools right on your phone or tablet.

While not everyone will be excited about it's large desktop design — without a plug-in design, there's no hiding this extender behind the couch or in the corner — and a price that's more expensive than some routers, the proof is in the performance. And boy, does the Netgear EAX20 deliver, with category-leading speeds and an awesome foot range. The Netgear EAX20 does one thing and does well: it extends networks that are faster and have a longer range than the competition.

Throw in a handful of customization options, and add a layer of online security to help protect your home network, and it's not hard to say that this admittedly pricey extender is worth every penny.

With solid basic Wi-Fi performance and dead-simple setup, this little Wi-Fi extender is a great way to cover the odd dead spot in your Wi-Fi coverage, or to push stronger wireless signals out to your back patio or garage. With a compact plug-in design and adjustable antennas, you can easily tuck the Rock Space extender out of the way, and setup can be done in just minutes, with no extra app to worry about.

And with solid middle of the road performance that works as well between floors as it does room-to-room, it's also a great choice for townhouses and other multi-floor homes. Just don't expect blazing speeds or advanced customization options — this is strictly for basic Wi-Fi. Need to beef up your Wi-Fi network coverage and range, but don't want an extender that stands out? It's easily the best Wi-Fi extender we've seen for people that want an unobtrusive design, instead of an antenna-festooned brick that blocks adjacent outlets.

The overall performance is pretty good, but that set-up assistant makes it a great choice for anyone that wants a little help getting things set up just right. D-Link's DAP is easy to set up, provides a convenient mobile app for managing device settings and can help fill a home with Wi-Fi. Despite some irregular performance, the D-Link DAP does particularly well when pushing signal to a floor above or below. That verticality makes it one of the best Wi-Fi extenders available for getting signal to every floor of a multistory home, making it the perfect choice for anyone who finds their Wi-Fi signal dropping out when they go up or down stairs.

With so many options for upgrading your home network, like getting a new router or a mesh router, or adding a Wi-Fi extender or powerline extender, how do you know which is the best option for you?

If most of your house is adequately served by the Wi-Fi router you already own, you may not need to buy a new one. A Wi-Fi extender is the perfect solution if you've got one room or one section of the house where your internet always seems to cut out. Wi-Fi extenders are great for knocking out a specific dead spot, for giving you a little more signal with a little more range, enough to reach that far room or give your Wi-Fi a little oomph to make it to the next floor. However, if you have large portions of your home or property that don't get adequate Wi-Fi, you may need to step up to one of the best mesh Wi-Fi systems , which use multiple devices to create a larger shared network.

If you have multiple rooms with spotty coverage, or a far end of the house that your router can't reach, or want to extend your coverage out to the backyard or garage, then a mesh kit is the better choice.

Every Wi-Fi extender we review is evaluated based on a combination of in-depth performance tests and hands-on usage in a real home. This mix of real-world use and controlled benchmark testing gives us a clear picture of how well each device performs. We use Ixia's IxChariot testing software to measure throughput at a variety of distances and environmental conditions.

This includes testing with the extender placed at 50 feet and 75 feet from the router. The software simulates traffic in a busy wireless network while measuring data flow back and forth.

The results are shown in megabits per second Mbps at a distance from the extender, with higher numbers indicating better performance. Measuring the throughput at various distances also lets us determine the effective range of the extender, giving you a better understanding of how well a device will do in covering the farthest corners of your home.

We also use each product in a real home, which has signal-thwarting brick walls and the sort of sturdy construction that basic routers struggle to contend with. In that environment we use the network for everything from listening to music and streaming video to performing additional tests and even writing the review. All of our reviews include additional details about the set-up process, the quirks and cool aspects of design, and all of the settings and management functions the device offers.

If you want to learn more about any of the best Wi-Fi extenders listed above, just check out the full reviews for more detailed information. Included in this guide: 1. Eliminate dead spots and stretch your Wi-Fi coverage with the best Wi-Fi extenders. Wi-Fi Spec: AC Ports: 1 gigabit Ethernet. These cookies are used to enhance the performance and functionality of our website but are non-essential to their use.

However, without these cookies, certain functionality may become unavailable. Advertising cookies are set to display targeted promotions or advertisements based upon your interests on the sites or to manage our advertising. These cookies collect information about your activities on these and other sites to provide you targeted advertising.

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Follow us on Facebook for industry news, sales, and promotions! Follow Us. Products to Try. Read More. WCBQ The maximum throughput over the MoCA network is up to 2. Affiliate Link Disclosure. By continuing to use our website, you acknowledge the use of cookies. Cookie settings Privacy Policy X. The Netgear has two 5 GHz channels rather than one, and that extra channel serves exclusively for communication between the extender and the router, freeing up the other 5 GHz channel and the 2.

For the same price as a router plus the EX, a mesh-networking kit gives you even more value. Kits have a unified administration page or mobile app, which is a lot easier to manage than two separate ones one for the extender and one for your standalone router.

And because all the components of a mesh-network kit are designed to work together, they may be a bit better at juggling devices than a standalone router with an add-on extender. Also, finding and speaking with tech support for a dedicated mesh kit is more convenient. As mentioned above, latency refers to the time you spend between clicking on a link and waiting for the next Web page, streaming video, or file download to come through.

During our multi-client testing, we looked at how well a Web browser connected through the extender performed typically the median as well as how poorly it did in its worst moments the 75th-, 90th-, 95th-, and 99th-percentile results.

This procedure allowed us to determine how frequently and how much the experience may frustrate you. Browsing performance was also excellent with the Netgear EX extender. Mesh technology optimizes the connections between the extender and the router; in our tests, it ensured that all six laptops got the best connection with the fewest dropoffs and the shortest wait.

Browsing performance was a little worse when we disabled OneMesh to show how each TP-Link extender would work with other, non-OneMesh routers. However, the RE still improved the Wi-Fi connection stability in most situations, particularly as the network experienced its worst moments, as shown past the 80 percent mark in the graph above.

Our stacked median latency chart above shows the typical latency for every computer on our test network at once, giving some idea of how the whole network will usually perform when multiple devices are making requests at the same time.

Each color bar represents someone waiting for something to happen after clicking a link, and longer bars mean more time staring at a spinning circle or pinwheel. In total, we found that it was roughly as fast as the Synology and D-Link mesh kits, which were among the quickest contenders during our latest round of mesh-kit testing. The RE with OneMesh enabled is next down the chart, with latencies that were seconds longer than those of the EX; the RE with OneMesh disabled performed a bit worse than that.

All of the setups above were faster than the Archer A7 alone, a result that demonstrates how these extenders can help active networks with moderate traffic. Although the TP-Link RE maintained rock-steady connections during our testing, it produced relatively long latency numbers once we turned OneMesh on. In that mode, It tended to use the slower 2. A wait of under 1, milliseconds or just under a second for half the Web pages requested is not an eternity, but compounded over many sites, the experience would be perceived as being quite a bit slower than using the RE as a non-mesh extender.

A lot of interesting Wi-Fi technologies are on the horizon. Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 6E , also known as the Wi-Fi 6 and 6E will bundle in lots of new features that should greatly improve networks with lots of active devices.

However, just like the different standards within We expect this trend will only continue as mesh becomes more mainstream and less expensive. It will work with any wireless router but will likely work best with a new Wi-Fi 6 router and Wi-Fi 6 devices. Like the Netgear mesh extenders, the two D-Link extenders are expected to be easier to set up and administer, with a unified network name. They are a mix of Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 5 options, most with mesh compatibility.

It has been replaced by the RE on stock lists and as our extender pick. Version 3 of the RE can be updated via firmware to work with OneMesh; you can check the label on the back of the extender to verify which version of the hardware you have. You may still be able to find the RE in some stores, but the RE is a few dollars less expensive.

It did poorly on our performance tests. These models either failed to meet our requirements, were discontinued by the manufacturer, or were dismissed in a previous version of this guide. It actually downloaded a 1 MB file over and over as fast as it could. This test measured throughput and speed, and—more important—put a constant load on the router that the other devices on the network had to work around.

Joel Santo Domingo is a senior staff writer covering networking and storage at Wirecutter. Previously he tested and reviewed more than a thousand PCs and tech devices for PCMag and other sites over 17 years. Before you buy, try Moving your router. Make sure your router is centrally located before trying an extender or booster. Our pick. Upgrade pick. Everything we recommend.