WiFi range extenders

Overall score breakdown

Overall score:

• Performance (60%)

• Ease of use (40%)

Performance based on throughput speed on 2.4 and 5GHz bands, comparing the loss in throughput speeds when connecting to the range extender versus connecting to the router.

Ease of use based on assessment of installation, software install/installation wizard, menu layout and configuration.

To test speeds, we place a range extender 10 metres from a router and then place a laptop 2.5 metres away from the range extender. We then transfer files from the range extender to the laptop on the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands.

As a point of reference, we then place the test laptop at the same spot where the range extenders were plugged in (10 metres from the router) and recorded the speeds. The loss in throughput speeds is the percentage difference compared to this reference speed. There is always a drop in speed when using a range extender as there is an additional step that the signal has to go through. This affects how quickly data can be transferred over the network. The larger the drop, the slower the network will be. For example, for one of the range extenders we tested, the signal was 36% slower on the 5GHz band and 24% slower on the 2.4GHz band compared to when the laptop was plugged into the router directly.