A wireless range extender, also called a Wi-Fi repeater or booster, seems like an easy solution for eliminating dead zones and boosting your home Wi-Fi coverage. However, there are some significant downsides to using traditional range extenders in 2023 that you should consider first.
In this guide, we’ll explain the top 7 reasons why you may want to avoid buying a new wireless range extender for your home Wi-Fi network and instead consider better alternatives.
What is a Wireless Range Extender?
Before diving into why you should avoid a wireless range extender, let‘s quickly cover what they are and how they work.
A Wi-Fi range extender (also called a repeater, booster, or expander) is a device that picks up an existing Wi-Fi signal, amplifies it, and rebroadcasts the boosted signal farther so you can access the internet in areas that otherwise have poor or no coverage (1).
The range extender works by receiving wireless signals from your router, then transmitting those signals farther at full strength to deliver boosted Wi-Fi access to devices in dead zones.
7 Reasons to Avoid Wireless Range Extenders in 2023
While Wi-Fi extenders seem like an easy fix for improving wireless coverage, they come with quite a few downsides — especially by today‘s standards.
Here are the top 7 reasons you may want to avoid buying a wireless range extender in 2023 and consider other home Wi-Fi solutions instead:
1. Reduce Bandwidth and Speed
One of the biggest problems with Wi-Fi extenders is that they often severely reduce your available bandwidth, resulting in much slower wireless speeds.
Because a range extender uses the same radio channel as your router, it has to share bandwidth with the router signal (2). Any bandwidth utilized by the extender gets taken away from bandwidth available for your devices to surf the web, stream movies, play games, and more.
Adding an extender can cut your available bandwidth in half or more, resulting in reduced Wi-Fi speeds throughout your home.
2. Increase Power Consumption
Unlike Wi-Fi access points that turn off when not in use, traditional wireless extenders are always on and drawing continuous power as they amplify and rebroadcast signals. This constant power drain runs up your electricity bill unnecessarily (3).
Newer models may incorporate energy-saving features to help offset this problem. Still, in general, Wi-Fi extenders use substantially more power than mesh systems and other modern solutions.
3. Add Complexity to Network Setups
Getting an older Wi-Fi range extender up and running often demands extensive configuration like manually selecting channels, tuning signal strength, and adjusting the extender‘s position for optimal performance. If you aren’t highly tech-savvy, setup can be overly complex and frustrating.
Once configured, wireless extenders also create network segmentation, forcing some devices onto a separate subnet connected through the booster instead of directly to your primary router. This makes unified management trickier and can lead to connectivity issues (4).
4. Potential Compatibility Issues
If your new extender doesn’t match the Wi-Fi specs of your existing router and devices, you may run into interoperability problems. For example, combining an 802.11ac router with an older 802.11n Wi-Fi extender often performs poorly.
Make sure any booster you buy matches your router‘s generation (802.11ac vs 802.11ax), frequency bands (2.4 GHz vs 5 GHz), and protocols (WPA3). If not, you’ll likely encounter connectivity problems (5).
5. Can Be Complicated to Set Up and Configure
In addition to complex network configuration menus, physically setting up a Wi-Fi repeater in your home can involve lots of tedious trial-and-error.
You need to place extenders in a “sweet spot” between your router and the dead zone to get a signal — but walls, floors, and interference easily disrupt this. It often takes lots of adjustments to positioning plus tweaks to channels, bands, and signal strength before boosters work correctly. What’s more, anytime you move furniture or buy a new appliance, it can knock your extender out of whack again.
Overall, getting everything properly tuned for robust coverage is complicated for average users.
6. May Slow Down Internet Speeds
One intention of buying an extender is faster Wi-Fi, but add-on boosters often have the opposite effect — reducing speeds across your network.
There are a few reasons this occurs:
First, remember that extenders slash your available bandwidth whenever actively receiving and rebroadcasting signals. This leaves less throughput for your devices.
Second, because data has to make extra wireless hops from the router to extender then to your device (instead of direct router-to-device), latency increases. Higher latency cripples real-time apps like online gaming, video calls, or live TV streaming (6).
Finally, whenever multiple gadgets connect through the booster simultaneously bandwidth splits further, slowing each one. Compared to modern mesh networks that intelligently manage demand across access points, traditional extenders bottleneck badly under load.
The result? Often frustratingly slow Internet across your network whenever actively using the extended range.
7. Security Risks
While Wi-Fi extenders use the same encryption protocols as your router to keep rebroadcasted signals secure, some models have vulnerabilities open to exploitation if not kept rigorously updated.
Research conducted by security company F-Secure in 2021 found over a dozen critical security flaws across popular extender models from manufacturers like Netgear, D-Link, TP-Link, and more. These left networks open to attack by hackers intercepting traffic or breaking into extenders to monitor unencrypted communications.
Keeping extenders securely configured and firmware updated is extra essential — but something many consumers overlook after the initial setup. Neglecting this maintenance makes your network more susceptible to breaches (7).
Better Alternatives to Extenders in 2023
Luckily, as Wi-Fi range extender technology has failed to keep pace over the years, better solutions for eliminating dead zones have hit the mainstream.
Instead of buying another outdated booster that will sap your speeds, consider these modern alternatives for upgrading home networks:
Mesh WiFi Systems
Mesh networks utilize multiple compact, stylish access points you place around your house. These units sync intelligently to create one unified blanket of strong Wi-Fi reaching every nook and corner.
Benefits of whole-home mesh systems include:
- More consistent speeds and coverage since bandwidth gets managed dynamically across nodes as you roam around using multiple devices simultaneously.
- Simple setup straight from an app — no need for complicated settings adjustments.
- Sleek, ultra-portable satellite units that fit anywhere for optimal placement.
- Seamless roaming without drops as you walk around the house; devices transition automatically between access points.
Our current top pick for Wi-Fi mesh is the TP-Link Deco AX3000. For under $180, it delivers next-gen Wi-Fi 6 speeds up to 3Gbps across over 6,500 square feet of space. We love how easy it is to set up the Deco app and achieve perfectly optimized placement using the smartphone guidance system.
Powerline WiFi Adapters
If you don’t need whole-home coverage, consider a powerline WiFi extender instead.
This technology transmits networking signals over your internal electrical wiring, so you can add access points anywhere an outlet exists without installing long ethernet cables.
- No configuration or ideal placement needed – just plug in adapters.
- Leverages your existing electrical system for solid, fast wired backbone connections.
- Add ports anywhere to connect devices like smart TVs, games consoles, printers etc. via Wi-Fi or ethernet cable as you choose.
We like the TP-Link AV2000 as a proven powerline option which delivers up to 2000Mbps networking over your home’s powerlines.
Wireless Access Points
Wireless access points provide similar functionality to commercial-grade Wi-Fi routers. They connect to your existing wired network infrastructure to project a strong wireless signal into an area requiring better coverage.
Benefits include:
- Robust Wi-Fi broadcasting strength for superior speed and range compared to consumer boosters.
- Advanced functionality like band steering, load balancing, natural roaming etc. comes standard.
- Easy to turn off when not needed to save energy.
- Add capacity with additional units as your network expands.
Overall wireless access points deliver vastly better performance, control, and reliability than plug-in signal boosters.
The NETGEAR WAX214PA gives you commercial-grade Wi-Fi 6 connectivity with advanced configuration options at very reasonable prosumer pricing.
Conclusion
While Wi-Fi range extenders promise an easy fix for eliminating dead zones, myriad frustrations usually follow thanks to reduced speeds, increased latency, complicated setups, and potential compatibility issues in the modern era.
Mesh networks, powerline adapters, and enterprise-level wireless access points now deliver vastly superior next-generation Wi-Fi experiences for similar or lower cost compared to buying another outdated booster.
Carefully evaluate your needs and available solutions before wasting money on extender technology that fails to satisfy today‘s bandwidth and mobility demands.
Adopt one of the modern alternatives above for faster, smarter whole-home coverage without surprises down the road.
