Solve your Wi-Fi problems with these smart router settings

By optimizing your router’s settings and placement in your home, you can achieve a more stable and faster Wi-Fi network.

Different routers offer different levels of customization, but the vast majority have at least the following settings: Channel width refers to how much of the available frequencies in a frequency band the communication between router and devices takes up.

If your router can choose the channel width automatically, this is likely to give you the best results.

Problems that can be solved with QoS are often due to something called bufferbloat, where the router queues up too many packets and can’t forward them all in a reasonable time.

Routers with large processors often do better without QoS than less well-equipped routers.

You can try enabling QoS if your router has the feature.

A Wi-Fi repeater extends an existing network by creating its own network.

Newer models can connect either by cable or wirelessly.

With mesh routers, you place two or more base stations in the home.

They connect to each other wirelessly but do so either smarter or with separate antennas and channels.