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Boost Your Wi-Fi Speed This Christmas By Not Placing Your Router In This Room

You could be able to increase your internet speed over the Christmas period just by moving your router out of a particular room in your home. 

As schools and businesses slowly come to a close for the Christmas break, you might find your home internet buckling under the increased traffic. Children home from school, friends and family visiting – There could suddenly be many more devices all trying to connect to your Wi-Fi at the same time. 

So making sure your router is placed in the prime position could be vital in making sure Netflix streams don’t buffer, online games don’t freeze and video calls with relatives don’t stutter and fail. 

How Can You Make Sure You Get the Fastest Internet Speeds Possible Over Christmas?

Hands up if you’ve got some kind of new device on your Christmas list? Imagine Santa delivers that new games console, smartphone or smart home gadget – But your Wi-Fi speed and signal can’t handle it.

Have you ever counted how many devices you have in your home that are connected to the internet at any given time? The obvious ones are smartphones, laptops and tablets. But then there’s the TV, online gaming, smart home devices like heating and lighting controls. 

Then add in these new devices and it’s little wonder the Wi-Fi might start to struggle. 

Here are some of our Wi-Fi experts top tips to keep your Wi-Fi quick this Christmas:

  • Never keep your router in a cupboard. We know they’re not the prettiest things, especially if you have an eye for design, but hiding it away in a cupboard is going to affect the strength of the signal
  • Avoid placing your router behind the TV as this can block the signal
  • We know everyone is trying to be savvy with their electric use to keep bills as low as possible, but switching off your router at night isn’t a good idea as it will miss automatic updates (and it won’t save you much money either)
  • Schedule a time once per month to switch the router off and reboot. This can help to clear any issues and keep it working to its full potential
  • Use a tool or app to check what internet speed you are getting. If it doesn’t match what you’re paying for, then give your ISP a call.
  • Place your router in the upright position it’s designed to be in – Not on it’s side or upside down
  • If possible, try to position your router in the centre of your home. This will help to ensure that the signal reaches every room.
  • Try not to place your router near large objects, mirrors or fish tanks as these can all inhibit the signal
  • You might see a decrease in internet speed if you put up your Christmas tree directly over or in front of your router. The lights placed on the tree can, in some cases, negatively affect the signal from the router. You can read more about this here. 

What Room Should You Never Have Your Router In?

There is one room in the home that has the most potential for causing interference to your router signal and wreaking havoc on your Wi-Fi. And that is the kitchen. This is the worst place you could choose to place your router. 

Your router is consistently beaming out signal the whole time it’s on and connected to your ISP. The kitchen has the highest possibility of interrupting this signal due to the appliances kept and used in there. 

Electronics and metal can cause a lot of problems for your Wi-Fi connection. Appliances like washing machines, fridges and ovens are metal heavy and can block the signal from your router if it is placed too close by. 

Appliances and electronic devices that emit their own signal can also cause interference, like microwaves. If your router is placed near the microwave, you will likely notice a big slow down of Wi-Fi every time the microwave goes on. 

Kitchens are not a good environment for your router, even if your kitchen is in the centre of your home. You will get much better signal strength and speed if you place your router in a room away from large appliances and signal emitting devices. 

Stay Connected This Christmas

Christmas is a time for connection – In real life with those closest to you, and online with those that live further afield. Don’t let your router position and Wi-Fi strength be the reason you can’t connect with loved ones this Christmas. 

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How Can I Test My Broadband Speed?

Are you paying for 70Mbps but only getting 1Mbps? If you’ve checked your router and everything seems in order there, then you might want to be reliably checking your broadband speed as well as your Wi-Fi. 

When you obtain broadband from an Internet Service Provider (ISP), they are responsible for getting their broadband service to your home as far as the router. That’s where their responsibility ends. After that, your Wi-Fi is up to you. 

A speed checker won’t check the speed of your Wi-Fi inside your home, but rather the broadband speed that is delivered to your premises before going through your router. 

It’s worth remembering that you will often be offered broadband speeds of ‘up to’ a certain Mbps – That means that roughly 10% of customers will get that speed, but many more will get lower. 

What is broadband speed affected by? 

There are lots of factors that affect broadband speed. 

  • The distance the property is from the exchange
  • The wiring (quality, number of joints)
  • Router quality
  • Time of day broadband is being used (How many people are vying for bandwidth at the same time)

When you are measuring broadband speed, it can also be affected by the router and the computer being used to test. 

The best way to get an accurate measure of your broadband speed is by connecting a device to the router using an Ethernet cable. Internet connections via Ethernet cable are faster and more reliable than Wi-Fi, so will give you a more reliable measure of broadband speed. 

To test your broadband speed, turn off the Wi-Fi on your device and then plug it directly into the router using an Ethernet cable. 

Remember that your ISP can’t do anything about your internet speed from your router onwards. By measuring the speed through an Ethernet cable, you can see how fast it’s coming in at. You are likely to measure a much lower speed using a device on the Wi-Fi. If the speed you measure via Ethernet cable is close to your Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) speed, then you’re doing alright. But you can’t expect to get the same speeds on a device using the Wi-Fi like your tablet or phone. 

How can I test my own broadband speed?

There are two types of speed tests you can do – Casual and Serious. 

How to Do a Casual Broadband Speed Test

Go to any broadband speed checker on your browser – You can find them on Google. You can run the test directly through your browser. 

How to Do a Serious Broadband Speed Test

This one is a bit more involved. 

  1. Turn off your PC / laptops Wi-Fi connection 
  2. Connect the PC / laptop to the router using an Ethernet cable
  3. Turn off any other devices that are using the internet connection (e.g. TV’s, smartphones etc
  4. Restart your router
  5. Restart your PC / laptop and keep any unnecessary programmes closed down (that includes anti-virus software)
  6. Open a clean browser window and go to your chosen broadband speed tester

What results should I be getting? 

To check if the results seem reliable, you can use different browsers and see if there is a difference, for example, between Edge and Chrome. If you are getting approximately the following speeds on the below connections, then you don’t have any major problems.

ADSL connection – 7Mbps

ADSL2 connection – 12-16Mbps

FTTC connection – 30Mbps

Cable connection – 50Mbps

Mobile broadband connection – 20Mbps 

Remember that the results can vary and can be affected by:

  • The server
  • The local exchange
  • The internet itself
  • And more! 

It may also be worth testing the speed at varying times of day and see what you find. 

How do I know which broadband speed checker to use?

For the best results, you should use a local service with the lowest latency or ‘ping’ rate. 

According to the Guardian, the three best speed checkers were:

I’ve tested my broadband speed and it looks fine – So why am I having issues? 

Maybe you’ve got a Wi-Fi problem rather than a broadband speed problem. 

If your device works better when it’s closer to the router, then perhaps the problem is the signal strength, and getting that signal to where you are wanting to use your device most. 

If your Wi-Fi is just slow in general, it could be that your router is the problem. If your ISP won’t upgrade the one you currently have, then maybe you could replace it with an alternative and upgrade it? 

The problem could even be your device itself! See if a friend or family member has a different / newer device that you could test on your Wi-Fi and see if you encounter the same problems. 

Who can help with broadband speed tests and Wi-Fi issues?

If all of the above feels a bit confusing or if you’ve carried out the test but don’t understand the results then don’t panic! Here at Geekabit, our Wi-Fi experts are currently developing our own best-in-class solution for supporting people who wish to record and verify their internet speeds. Coming soon!

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