STOP using this useless tech in 2025!

It's the end of 2024 and people are still using WiFi Extenders to get faster wifi to get faster internet. Why? There are much better solutions to increase your wifi speed!

RT-BE58U:

RT-BE92U:

0:00 Do WiFi Extenders work?
0:30 Speed Test with just a router
1:55 Speed test with the WiFi Extender
3:54 How to get faster WiFi with a Mesh Node
5:33 Speed test with the Mesh Node

SUBSCRIBED YET?

#TheTechieGuy
Want to protect yourself from scams?
What is the best security?
How do you keep safe online?
Then you are in the right place!
We cover everything from Security and Scams to How Tos, Tips and Tricks, Faster Internet.
My name is Liron Segev, aka TheTechieGuy, and I make tech simple for everyone to understand!

Liron Segev aka TheTechieGuy

FYI: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases

[LironSegev]

There seems to be some confusion about the extender's job, so let me clarify:
You get an extender and you get a repeater. Unfortunately, both of these are used interchangeably which causes confusion.

A real extender is when you hard-wire with an ethernet cable to the access point ie. this black box.
This gives the extender the full speed capability so that when it extends the network it has the max speed that it can get from the router. That is how you should be using an extender.

What most people do is use this black box wirelessly.
This means that it acts as a repeater.

It takes whatever wireless signal it gets from the router and repeats it.
When it does that it, reduces the speed of the connectivity - usually by half.
So if you get 100Mbps at the black box, when it repeats it and spreads the wireless signal, you get 50Mbps.

Now when it comes to coverage:
The black box, being closer than the router, spreads the wireless signals to cover any places that previously didn't have signals or had weak signal. So it does work for that and you feel like you are getting more coverage as your wifi indicator shows it is full.
Yes, you get that coverage BUT at half the speed of the router.

So: If you just want to spread the wireless signal and don't care about the speed, then this black box works.
However, if you want to spread the signal AND get faster speed, then a Mesh Node is the option to go with.

If you don't want to buy a Mesh Node, then hard wire the black box to get the max speed that you can. But in most cases, people have these boxes because they can't run an ethernet cable.

Hope that helps.

[JW-sofc]

I always used my extender to extend the wifi. I never thought it would be used to increase speed. I no longer have dead spots in my backyard...its all a care about.

[PoulLausen]

Speed ​​is one thing, but the fact that Mesh provides a seamless connection is the best thing for me.

[Jimmythepin]

A WiFi extender is NOT supposed to strengthen WiFi signal, or increase WiFi speed. It it designed to EXTEND THE RANGE of your WiFi and they all do of what your SPONSOR says.

[Paul-L]

I try telling people you can't get better speed with an extender than mesh but they believe it's the same thing 😂

[Alan-rtse]

I have a doorbell camera that is on the edge of coverage for my router, and sometimes would drop out of the network. It is a pain to get it synced back up with the network, so I have a wi-fi extender near the front door specifically for the doorbell camera to connect to. In that case the extender makes sense. As you pointed out, it's slower than the wi-fi signal from the router, but the camera can stay synced with the extender better than with the router and the speed doesn't really matter. But I already had the extender before this problem came up. If I was buying something now to improve connectivity with the doorbell camera, I'd go with a mesh network as you described.

[jimbcanine]

I paid $5 for my Wifi Extender at a thrift shop and it does exactly what I want. Or I could go to Amazon and pay $200 or $300 for the routers he advertises in his description.

[Michael-hyk]

Good info. I love your channel. Always usefull info. I especially appreciate little to no talk about overclocking to get a nanosecond more speed for gaming or talk about the latest $2000 video card with an RGB lightshow. Just useful practical info for the regular user. Also, you don't bloat your videos with extraneous useless filler. Well done Liron! I'm a new subscriber.

[SloppyGoat]

A Wi-Fi extender is not designed to increase your speed. It's just to increase your distance. As if you set up another router as a bridge, or a repeater.

[justinsayre]

Second video from you that I've watched, enjoyed both. The first was the one about what your phone (Android) is connecting to, even in standby, using Pihole as a DNS sleuth. Loved that one. Would be very interested to see the ASUS devices behind Pihole or similar to see what/if they connect to stuff periodically. I assume that they will get some level of updates, but wonder what else they're talking to... Thanks and great job.

[johnc]

Fun video -- and very educational as always. Just don't trip on a pet or garden hose running back and forth through your lovely backyard when you do those speed tests! 😍

[hstubbs]

I work from home, and built a shed in the backyard to be my home office / work shop, so I wasn't just in the house all day ... Only to find when i closed the door to the shed, the Wi-Fi signal from the house went to just about bupkiss... the shed is maybe 70ft from the router inside the house .

I'm using a $20 WiFi extender that looks basically like the one held up in the beginning of the video, placed under the floor of the shed so it has "line of sight" to the router and my devices in the shed...

I really don't see the benefit in spending more money on something more complicated if you're literally trying to extend the range like in my case... If the shed was further, say hundreds of feet, , the mesh node wouldn't even be an option... I'd be looking at point-to-point antennas or just running cable of some type.

All this to say - cheap/simple isn't always going to do what you need. I'm glad I watched the video, as the use case mentioned was not what i expected... Yes, if the goal is faster WiFi across a larger area, simple repeaters/extenders are not likely to be the answer...

Another thing though - i don't think most people are aware how Wi-Fi works and more importantly how devices negotiate the communications.. multiple devices on the same Wi-Fi have higher chance of collision, needing both devices to back off and try again.. when the devices are close together - like your phone and the smart TV you're watching YouTube on, they can 'hear' if the other device started transmission and wait their turn, avoiding the collision.. but when the devices are on opposite sides of the house with the router between them, they may not 'hear ' the other device so well, slowing down the entire network..

I had to learn all of that dealing with slow WiFi under Linux, when the same computer with the same Wi-Fi adapter worked well under Windows... Had to tweak the settings for collisions and such manually... Arrgh.

[robertmason]

Wifi extender is a lot cheaper. About $35 . Outher devices $200 or more.

[colobisman]

My router is in my office only 7 steps from the top of my basement stairs. I get a terrible (almost nonexistent) WiFi connection when I go in the basement. I put a WiFi extender in an outlet at the top of the stairs and now I can connect to the internet. All I can say is it works.

[roadmonitoroz]

Personally I ran a wired indoor / outdoor access point as I couldn't access the wifi from certain locations. The access point is fast and is manageable (much higher spec than my router) . Of course this means running some cat6, but it's POE so easy as to set up.
Plug that into an existing router or switch and you're set to go.
Now I can access the internet from the garage and even the street. It's got a strong password, but I should also set up some mac filtering

And yeah, I've had the misfortune of using a wifi extender before (years ago) :(

[DeepThink]

If you’re like me and you don’t want a mesh network with satellites in each room of your house where people sleep (you don’t want to sleep next to a a device blasting high frequencies), I would suggest a Moca Adaptor, which utilizes pre-existing coaxial cable in your walls. You will have to contact your ISP to activate these coaxial outlets. The moca adaptor will allow you to connect lan cables to a switch, which will allow you to wire your internet connection for all your devices in your room without having to sleep next to a router or satellite/extender. Just my $0.02.

[angheloiumarius]

Cable & router - the best solution ever

[nelsonsteven]

What app do you use to measure the wifi signal in your video, not speedtest but the other one shown.

[richscott]

Thank you.. also must be nice to have Fios. Glad all works well. Next video please.

[LorisSawmill]

You can't get any speed faster than what your ISP provides you.