Need faster internet speed? Know the best place to keep the router in the house

For better internet speed, it is considered best to keep the router in the central part of the house and in an open space. Wi-Fi signals spread everywhere, so if the router is placed in a corner, the signal will not reach evenly throughout the house. Placing the router inside thick walls, closed cupboards, store rooms or electrical boxes weakens the signal. At the same time, the router should not be kept near big metal objects like refrigerator, due to this the metal weakens the Wi-Fi signal to a great extent.

Instead of keeping the router on the floor, it is better to keep it on a high shelf or wall at a height of about 5 to 7 feet. Due to this, the signal spreads better throughout the house. If your router has external antennas, keep them in the upright position. Even in a wall-mounted router, place the antenna in such a way that it covers as much area as possible. Routers that do not have external antennas should be kept upright on a flat surface and for wall-mounted models, the company’s guidelines should be followed.

If your house is a two-storey house, then it is better to keep the router in a central location near the ceiling of the ground floor or in the lower part of the second floor. Due to this, signals reach both the upper and lower floors better. At the same time, if the house is very big and signals do not reach everywhere from one router, then repeater or mesh Wi-Fi system can be used. This provides uniform and stable internet network throughout the house.

If you are near the router and there is no major obstruction in between, the 5GHz band provides better speeds. Whereas if you have to use internet in another room across many walls, then 2.4GHz band is considered more stable. Apart from this, by setting QoS (Device Priority) in the management app of the router, office computers or important devices can be given priority, so that other devices do not use more internet speed than necessary.

Keeping the router in the kitchen is not considered appropriate, microwaves and large household devices can interfere with the Wi-Fi signal. Similarly, the router should not be kept inside a closed cabinet or media console. At such places, the signal becomes weak and the router may also overheat, due to which both the internet speed and the performance of the device can be affected.

If the network is found to be weak again and again in any part of the house, then test the speed there with different devices to check whether the problem is with the router or any one device. Restarting the router from time to time clears the cache and software updates are also implemented properly, which sometimes solves the problem of slow speed. Apart from this, keeping the router’s firmware updated, changing between 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands if necessary and testing the speed by choosing the right place also helps in providing better internet.