Your COVID-19 Internet problems might be COVID-19 Wi-Fi problems

Enlarge / Left to right: a looming Netgear Orbi satellite, an upside-down Plume superpod, and an older Eero model. (credit: Jim Salter)

The Great Telework Experiment of 2020 has brought a lot of network challenges to the fore. Obviously some jobs are better suited to remote work than others, and some companies were better prepared to shift in that direction. However, successful telework isn't just about the company infrastructure-it's about employees' home setups, too.

Most of the folks needing to work from home also need to work from Wi-Fi. And Wi-Fi, unfortunately, doesn't scale very well: the more people and devices you cram onto it, the slower and balkier it gets. There are two ways you can alleviate this problem: you can plug your device directly into the router (or a connected switch) with an Ethernet cable, or you can improve your Wi-Fi itself.

Buying a new router is unlikely to substantially improve your Wi-Fi-but if you've got a single router now, upgrading to mesh almost certainly will.

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