Tenda Nova MW3-3 Mesh WiFi System - Up to 3500 sq.ft. Whole Home Coverage, WiFi Router and Extender Replacement, AC1200 Mesh Router for Wireless Internet, Works with Alexa, Parental Controls, 3-pack

Product Information

If the extender has advanced features, we’ll also factor these into our review; we’ll thoroughly explore the configuration portal to see how responsive and user-friendly it is, and, if the unit has an Ethernet port, we may test network performance over a wired connection. Why we like it: A gorgeous design and vast functionality mean that Nest WiFi – Google's offering – would be the best of the best, were it not for the vertiginous cost Right, let's get specific. Here's what I founded when reviewing the best WiFi extenders on the market, starting with my favourite... The best WiFi extenders 1. TP Link Deco AC1300 Whole-Home Wi-Fi System Still, they work just fine and are just as simple to set up as the rest of the mesh networks on here (though the app is weird and doesn't seem to have been written by someone with a great grasp of English.) Read more: The best laptops for students and best external hard drives Frequently asked questions about WiFi extenders Do wireless extenders work?

However, if you mean boosting the speed of your WiFi, there might not be a lot you can do. Manually changing your WiFi channel or paying for a better tariff from your ISP might help. Different parts of the country get different WiFi speeds and that’s usually just down to infrastructure and whether they’ve got round to installing fibre optic cabling in the area. How far do wireless extenders reach? Both sets of devices will be slightly different per brand or even per product, but you should be looking at an average of about 50-75ft. Also, I found the range on each individual node left something to be desired compared to the competitors. MBps: This unhelpfully similarly named acronym is short for megabytes per second. This refers to the amount of data being transferred. TP-Link’s RE300 is basic, but it’s incredibly easy to set up via the TP-Link Tether app and it comes with a couple of extra modes to help you make the most of your current wireless network. We found it worked best in default mode, where speeds averaged 11.3MB/sec in testing. If you’re a tinkerer, however, you can also set it up so it uses the faster 5GHz band as a dedicated link to your existing network and the 2.4GHz band for your devices.The Magic 2 kit beats the old Magic 1 kit we had in this slot by giving you two high-speed 867Mbits/sec Wi-Fi streams for little more than the price of one, which comes in handy if you’re trying to network two or more devices. Advanced users will appreciate the companion app that shows connection diagnostics, so you can work out where to locate the plugs for the best performance. The web portal, meanwhile, lets you manage your wireless configuration, set up a guest network and apply an operating schedule so that (for example) the extended network is only available during office hours. The newer Wi-Fi 6 kits will give you even more performance if you have Wi-Fi 6 devices, but if not this is a great solution. Whole Home WiFi sits between Google and TP Link in terms of functionality. It can do everything that its competitors can do, minus Google's home control elements. Considering it is the cheapest of the three, you may not miss any of that. Up until recently, most extenders and Powerline kits only went as far as the Wi-Fi 5 standard, but we’re seeing a growing number that go faster with Wi-Fi 6 support. If you only have a Wi-Fi 5 router, you can save some cash by partnering it with a Wi-Fi 5 extender, but the newer models may give you a faster connection between the extender and devices that support Wi-Fi 6. What’s more, there’s an argument that buying one of these makes more sense if you plan to upgrade your network in the future. What’s the difference between a repeater and a powerline extender? Having a good, reliable WiFi signal at home has never been more important. Increasingly, we depend on the internet in every room in the house, to connect our smart devices, be they phones, tables or toasters.

The primary unit has connected to the internet. For secondary units, this means that it has successfully connected to the primary unit. Blinking fast Mesh networking systems work in a similar way to Wi-Fi repeaters but they give you the option of placing multiple nodes all over your home to cover a larger area than a single extender could manage. You can learn more, and explore our recommended models, in our guide to the best mesh Wi-Fi routers. As a rule, we’re happy with anything over 120Mbits/sec (15MB/sec). To put that into context, Netflix recommends a connection speed of at least 5Mbits/sec for HD streaming and 25Mbits/sec for 4K video. A good, solid Wi-Fi network should easily be fast enough to cope with multiple simultaneous high-resolution video streams. The tagline TP Link are using for the Deco mesh system is 'paint your home in Wi-Fi', which is a pretty fair assessment of the technology. Want to paint an extra room in WiFi? Buy another node. Wish you hadn't painted the kid's room in WiFi? Take the node away.The only one you could theoretically keep extending is a mesh network. You could conceivably just keep adding nodes to cover as much area as you liked with no slowdown or loss of signal. A glossary of terms Router: The box that your internet signal comes out of. Usually you’ll get a router installed when you sign up to a certain internet service provider. Sometimes brands call these devices ‘hubs’. If you mean boosting the range of your WiFi signal then you can do so with a mesh network, WiFi repeater, or powerline adapter, as described above.

Modem: The vast majority of providers combine their modems and routers so you won’t have two separate devices. In short, a modem is the device which actually connects your network to the internet. Modem is a portmanteau of the words ‘modulator’ and ‘demodulator’. It turns one signal into another signal. For example, it turns digital data of a computer into the analogue signal of a telephone line. This is why you used to have to connect your internet to the phone line. SSID: Short for ‘set service identifier’, it’s the name of the network you’re connected to. For example, that might be “_The Cloud” or “BTHomeHubX98281” or “VM217321”. Some ISP’s allow you to change the SSID, some don’t. Either way, once you’re connected it doesn’t really matter. The only thing to consider is that if you get a WiFi repeater or a Powerline Adapter, they sometimes have a different SSID to your main one. None of this is particularly unique to TP Link. Most of the mesh networks I tested can do the same or similar things, but TP Link wins in terms of ease-of-use and accessibility.

The Tenda Nova MW3 is the cheapest mesh wireless kit we've come across, and it isn't half bad, either

Every Wi-Fi extender we review goes through extensive hands-on testing. Each unit is installed in a real home, at an appropriate distance from the main Wi-Fi router according to the manufacturer’s recommendations. If it’s a powerline system, we connect the base unit to the main router via gigabit Ethernet and, again, situate the remote unit according to the instructions.