Fixing WiFi dead spots without buying a faster package

A room with weak WiFi is almost never a reason to buy a faster broadband package. The signal is already at your router; the problem is the last ten metres inside your own home. Upgrading the line makes that journey no easier.

The fix is a diagnosis in the right order, because the cheap solutions are usually the ones that work.

Test the line first with a cable. If the wired speed is close to what you pay for, the line is fine and the problem is WiFi coverage inside your home. Move the router out of cupboards and off the floor before buying anything; if that is not enough, one additional access point or a mesh node placed between the router and the dead spot solves most cases for less than a year of a faster package.

Step one: separate the line from the WiFi

Connect a laptop to the router with an ethernet cable and run a speed test in the room where the router sits, in the evening. Then repeat over WiFi in the same room, and again in the room that feels slow.

Three results tell you everything. If wired is close to the advertised figure, the line is healthy. If WiFi in the same room is much lower than wired, the radio is the bottleneck. If WiFi in the same room is fine and only the far room is slow, you have a coverage problem — which is the most common case and the easiest to fix.

Step two: free fixes, in order

• Get the router off the floor and out of any cupboard. Radio does not travel through metal, foil-backed plasterboard or a boiler.
• Move it away from the TV, the microwave and cordless phone bases. All of them interfere, particularly on the 2.4 GHz band.
• Centralise it. A router in the front-room corner wastes half its output through the outside wall.
• Stand it upright if the design allows — internal antennas are usually optimised for that orientation.
• Switch devices that never move (TVs, consoles, desktop PCs) to a cable. Every device off the WiFi is bandwidth returned to the ones that need it.

Step three: paid fixes, ranked

If placement does not solve it, these are the options in ascending order of cost. The right answer for most homes is the second one.

• Powerline adapters — £30–£60. Sends the signal over the mains wiring. Works well within one ring circuit, poorly across different circuits, and performance varies unpredictably between houses. Worth trying where WiFi cannot reach at all.
• A single additional access point or mesh node — £50–£120. Placed halfway between the router and the dead spot, connected by cable if at all possible. This is the most reliable fix per pound.
• A two or three unit mesh system — £120–£300. Appropriate for large or long properties, or where running a cable is impossible. Buy the version with a dedicated backhaul channel if the budget allows; cheaper units halve their throughput repeating the signal.
• WiFi extenders (repeaters) — £20–£50. The cheapest option and the one most likely to disappoint: they repeat a weak signal weakly, and they typically halve the speed of everything connected through them.

What not to bother with

A faster broadband package, if your wired speed already matches what you pay for. A new router from the provider, unless yours is more than four or five years old and the provider is offering a newer model free. Signal boosters advertised with large numbers of antennas and no specification. And any solution that requires you to put an antenna in a different room without a cable — you are repeating a weak signal, not creating a strong one.