Why Your Home Wifi Is Slow and How to Fix It

Slow wifi is maddening because you can never quite put your finger on why. You reboot the router, things perk up for half an hour, then you are back to watching the little spinning circle. Sound about right?

Here is the reassuring bit. Nearly every slow wifi problem comes down to one of a small number of things, and once you have worked out which, the fix is usually quick and often free.

The Most Common Causes

• 1
  The router is in a bad spotSignal spreads out in every direction from the router. Tuck it in a corner, hide it in a cupboard or sit it on the floor and you have thrown most of that signal away before it gets anywhere near you.
• 2
  The router has had its dayThe box your provider sent is usually cheap. Once it is four or five years old it can struggle to keep up with a modern home full of phones, laptops, tellies and a dozen smart gadgets all wanting attention at once.
• 3
  Everything is fighting over one bandSmart plugs, bulbs and cameras nearly all sit on the 2.4GHz band. Leave your phone and laptop there too and they are all elbowing each other for room. Shift the phone and laptop to 5GHz and things open right up.
• 4
  Walls and the neighboursSolid walls, concrete floors and a dozen nearby networks all chip away at your signal. In flats and terraces the 2.4GHz band can get properly crowded.
• 5
  It might not be the wifi at allSometimes the wifi is fine and the line coming into the house is the weak link. Plug a laptop straight into the router with a cable, run a speed test, and you will know in seconds.

Try These Before Spending Anything

Work through these in order. They sort the problem far more often than people expect.

Shift the router

Get it as central as you can, up high, out in the open, and away from the microwave and cordless phone. For a lot of homes this one move clears up the dead spots on its own, and it costs you nothing but a few minutes.

Give it a proper reboot

Not a quick tap of the button. Pull the plug out of the wall, count to thirty, plug it back in and let it fully wake up before you test anything. Make a habit of it once a month and you will head off a lot of niggles.

See what band you are on

Type 192.168.1.1 into a browser to reach your router settings and look for whether the network is split into 2.4GHz and 5GHz. If it is, put your phone and laptop on 5GHz for a real jump in speed up close, and your smart gadgets will breathe easier on 2.4GHz with them out of the way.

When Mesh Is the Real Answer

A big house, thick walls, or rooms spread over three floors will defeat a single router no matter where you put it. There is only so far one box can throw a signal. That is the point where mesh earns its keep.

Mesh systems dot a few units around the house and join them into one network. Walk from room to room and your phone quietly hops to whichever unit is closest, so there is no fiddling, no dead corners and no crawling speeds in the back bedroom.

If you are shopping, these are the three I steer most people towards.

When to Call Someone In

Plenty of wifi gripes are easy to sort yourself. Others, like a neighbour's network treading on yours, settings buried deep in the router, or picking the right mesh kit for an awkward house, take a bit more poking around to pin down.

If you have done the basics and it is still dragging, get a fresh pair of eyes on it. Most of these jobs are done inside an hour, and knowing exactly what is wrong before you go buying hardware tends to save you money rather than cost it.

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