Router recommendations?
Hello my fellow tildestians (tilderinos?) - I'm looking to upgrade a very old home router (a hand-me-down linksys of some variety). I game quite a lot (my computer is connected via ethernet to the current router) (often while others folks are streaming shows elsewhere in the house) so preferably something that is able to handle that? Maybe something that would allow a later upgrade with mesh? I don't know what a mesh is but I see them recommended in a lot of these "best router of 2026" lists so maybe that's something I need to look into.
I've seen a lot of recommendations for asus and tp-link and ubiquiti? I am not super technically inclined so ease of set up is a nice bonus but I'm willing to put in the effort if needed >_< Budget is around ~300 usd. Blessings be if you have the time and knowledge to spare for me :) thank you!
(also, if this is in the wrong topic please relocate me with my sincerest apologies)
Mikrotik. Very reliable. Recommended to me by a sys admin. Steer away from DLink.
My view might be skewed from only using their crazy >100GbE stuff, but is Microtik the way to go for someone who considers themselves not that techie? I didn’t think they had a particularly strong UX focus even on the more consumer grade stuff.
I've used Mikrotik, Ubiquiti, Gl.Inet, and various OpenWrt-flashed devices.
Mikrotik can work reasonably well from a feature, configuration, and reliability standpoint, but I've had performance problems with them. You need to be careful with the specs of what you're buying; in my case I needed SFP, and that works fine, but I didn't realize how poor the wifi reception and performance on the device would be.
Unless they've changed significantly, Ubiquiti makes unfortunate choices with their management software being arranged around needing a constant, and often very heavy, management service, arguably to sell cloud services and extra devices, and at times just abandons classes of devices (eg, the EdgeRouter X I have). I've had reasonable success recently reflashing them with OpenWrt (eg, some Unifi APs), but I'm not sure this is always feasible.
Gl.Inet actually make some quite good devices overall, often with combinations of hardware features that aren't available elsewhere. I've been happy with the GL-X3000 I have from them, and will probably end up buying more. However, from a software side, they are not usually running anything near standard OpenWrt: they use their own much more limited and wonky management UI, use very outdated kernel and firmware versions that they unconvincingly argue they keep secure, and while they give access to the standard LuCi, they have so many wonky, hard-coded scripts all over the place that many features break if you aren't using them they way they expect. Reading carefully can also be important, as they'll sometimes make claims that 'aren't technically false', eg, saying that a device 'supports eSIMs' with fine print noting that it does not actually support eSIMs directly, but can use a physical SIM adapter you can buy from them. I feel like they unofficially target, especially on their cellular routers, the market of remote workers trying to hide their location, and sometimes their configuration is too tailored to that market. With all that said, I just replaced the firmware with standard OpenWrt, and have had no problems since. They also seem rather accommodating and friendly compared to other companies, and seem to be fine with people using standard OpenWrt.
There is the point that otherwise constrained consumer hardware from major brands that happens to have good OpenWrt support can sometimes have better performance for the same cost. But there's perhaps a question of whether you want to support those companies.
Despite being nominally a firmware intended for normal home router-with-ap devices, I've actually had mostly good experiences with OpenWrt. My setup is far outside a normal home setup (multiple locations, multiple connections, assigned IP space, complicated split-horizon DNS, ansible-managed). The one major problem I have with it is its really mediocre upgrade mechanisms.
For what it’s worth the UCG series (their consumer/small office routers), and I think the UDM series as well (same market segment, WiFi integrated rather than separate, although I strongly prefer separate), have pretty solid CPUs for the price and run the controller software locally nowadays.
I get the impression they’re moving away from the separate controller (either software or hardware) that used to be their default and just beefing up the gateway devices to be the controller as a way to either make for a cleaner user experience, or increase vendor lock in, depending on your viewpoint.
They still do this separate controller garbage, at least with their switches.
I have a switch of theirs that I lost the controller container for, and in order for me to manage it ever again, I need to factory reset the switch, which means I have to remember every trunk configuration on every port, and its just such a huge pain in the ass that I've been putting it off for six months. There's no way that I know of to recover the configuration that already exists on the switch.
Never buying another device of theirs again because of that whole experience.
Yep, this is the one massive downside to my Unifi access points! I have now lost my local software controller twice (one was my fault and the other was an unraid config problem) and anytime this happens, if i ever want to reconfigure or update my access points i have to factory reset both of them and start from scratch.... sigh
I will say that doing so isn't actually that painful or long of a process it's just annoying to do so i have been putting it off.
I should also make config backups next time to speed up the process instead of setting up from scratch. I can imagine this is a nightmare for a switch esp without a config backed up! And yeah the catch-22 is the only way to get the current config is to be able to log in, which requires the controller. Sigh.
They should at least let you physically plug in to extract a config or something or have some multi-factor emergency process but i guess that's arguably a security decision or something, idk
Yeah, with my AP it's not so bad. With my switch, it's uniquely terrible. Without getting super deep into it, I run everything in my house off of one chassis, my router is a VM, my container host is a VM, so on and so forth, so when I want to get to the server VLAN to the workstation VLAN, I need a router which lives on that sever chassis, and has a trunk port passed through to the VM, and it's just this... Horrible chicken or the egg scenario that involves my internet being down for hours while I rebuild the whole thing and put patch cables in different places.
The whole thing could be so much easier with a console cable and CLI access to my switch configuration, but ubiquiti thinks that's a bad idea for some reason.
I've been in the sysadmin / network admin / software engineering space for around 10 years now.
At home, I use UniFi. I wouldn't recommend it for you however, since you specifically said you're not super technically inclined. I appreciate that it is entirely self-hostable (no Cloud) for those with the inclination to do so. UniFi requires some set up, but once it's done, it simply ticks away in the background - no management needed. The UIs they have are pretty consistently of a good quality. I will note that UniFi typically keeps devices specialized - a router is a router, and not a Wi-Fi access point. A router is not a switch. A switch is not a router. You may need to buy a Wi-Fi access point in addition to a router if you go the UniFi route, but you get what you pay for - their hardware (and performance) is excellent.
I've heard good things about Mikrotik. I can't speak for it, but it's also probably a decent choice.
There's nothing inherently wrong with the consumer brand all-in-one routers like TP-Link or Asus. It might be the right choice for you, as you seem to have basic needs. If you do choose a "consumer" router, I'd stick with a cheap one, with basic features - look for Wi-Fi 5 (at least) with 5ghz + 2.4ghz bands built in, gigabit ethernet (referring to the speed of the ethernet ports), and multiple ethernet ports. The user interfaces are usually kind of shitty, but they'll work for the most part.
Fun fact - Unless you're an exceptional case (weird hardware), you can simply name your 5g and 2.4g Wi-Fi SSIDs the same. Your device will choose the best one. I always question why people separate them out.
I used to have them on the same name, then I was getting inopportune connection drops in games as my devices would opt to switch. Some (most?) would handle it OK, but I was seeing reports of folks having the issue on the same game with the same router and fixing it that way.
And this way it is more obvious why my connection is slow if it fell back to 2.4. I used to have devices that still hadn't picked up 5 and haven't bothered to turn off 2.4 since upgrading, but it does give better coverage at the extremes of my house.
I use UniFi at home, and also did the same for the small startup I'm working at where I was there from day 1 and needed to set up an office network. I use the UDR, which is an all in one unit with a switch, router, and wifi access point. I didn't find the configuration to be any harder than any of the consumer grade routers.
I have both an OpenVPN and WireGuard VPN server running on both configurations and I get security notifications pushed to my phone for the office network.
Interestingly my home configuration is more complex since my house is bigger than our one room office, so I have two PoE wifi access points. They're in my basement since the basement has a drop ceiling and it was easy to run the wire, and they have nice brackets to mount to the drop ceiling cross-bars. I get good coverage both upstairs and downstairs, each floor is about 1600 sq ft.
I had Mikrotik (the one with wifi and 5 ethernet ports, cant remember now), but when I moved from central Europe to Nordics I wanted to try Ubiquiti Edgerouter X (+Unifi AP) but after a while I upgraded the firmware and somehow got it bricked. After that I went for Mikrotik hEX with an Unifi access point... The combination still works to this day, every few months I restart the router and even that is just to update the firmware.
For the Unifi access point its a bit annoying the need to run the controller on some other machine so you can update and configure the access point... I might be looking for some other access point because of that, maybe I will in the future open a "AP recommendations?" topic, here on Tildes. But I do not want to run the WiFi on the same device as the router - its just a torture for the device because of heat generation.
It definitely depends on your technical inclination and your house design.
If you need mesh, there are lots of similar options out there. Folks seem to like eero but you can look around at reviews -- as far as I can tell, all of these have apps for managing your network and other smart functionality that I'm not interested in. But you do you!
I have heard very good things about GL.iNet. Some of the best price/performance ratio in modern networking, but they aren't too technical to set up. The Flint 3 or 3e would serve you well for the next decade, I imagine.
I use an OpenWRT one, myself, and I'm entirely happy with it. But we only have 100/100Mbps fiber -- some folks claim it struggles with gigabit speeds. And it's only wifi 6, not 7 like the Flints and most modern mesh.
Ubiquity is allegedly quite good but I haven't used them at all. Great reviews, but... cloud integration isn't something I want, and all their offerings seem to be a solid $100 more than the equivalent GL.iNet alternative. Still, if you want a weird wifi egg instead of a dead wifi spider, the Dream Router 7 seems lovely. Just pricey. And they seem to target a slightly more technical user than the average router, offering some nice customization while keeping things mostly plug-and-play.
Anyway, I would caution you to think twice about cloud integration -- it's nasty for personal privacy (who knows who eero sells your activity to, and Google is surely harvesting plenty as well) -- and it's literally a backdoor in your network infra that you can never fix. A lot of the companies offering apps and cloud services for your router are increasingly leaning on upsells, so prepare yourself for upsell popup dialogs when you're trying to open a port, gated functionality, and updates that break old functionality in favor of a new paid alternative. And of course ads in the interface! Unlike a smart TV, you can't just leave your router disconnected from the internet.
I’ve had good experiences with GL.iNet gear. I’ve got a portable 4G WiFi hotspot with a battery from them that I’ve been using without problems for about 6 years now. Reliable and easy to use.
FWIW I run OpenWRT on an old Linksys 1900AC with only Wifi 5. Symettrical 1gbps fiber.
Ethernet handles gig just fine. Wifi maxes out at the bandwidth available with Wifi 5, on the order of 400mbps.
I will caveat that I'm only using WPA2, as I'm in a somewhat rural area where anybody that could sniff my wifi packets would have to be in my yard.
That, and the DNS is a bit crap, but I suspect that is in no small part due to my own privacy-over-convienience config.
+1 for glinet. I had an asus router that died a few years ago, and it seemed like asus quality / reviews had declined, so I tried tp-link. Maybe I just got a bad one, but I couldn't get it to stay connected. Returned it and got a glinet router. It's been fine. I like that the firmware is open, and I didn't find it any harder to set up than other routers I have had.
I'd buy what I have now - Ubiquiti... What was the name? looking it up Cloud Gateway Ultra.
You get the Ubiquiti software, are ready for their Unifi APs (as the router is what it is - just a router) and you get their VPN service (which I don't use) so you can connect inside your home LAN without having public IP or ports forwarded.
The router has web UI which is really good and let's you setup things like SSIDs of your various wifis, guest hotspot, VLAN, WPA 3 AES (certificate based), traffic preference (ie. wifi calling, Microsoft Teams etc.), traffic limits (per device, per network, probably per service), you can see how the devices are connected (Wifi 4, Wifi 6 etc. and the sleeds they negotiated and also the actual speed flowing), you can see statistics of what clients use most inetnet bandwidth and in what manner (TLS/SSL, QUIC, VPN etc.). You can probably setup if client can be online at certain time (ie. kids have no wifi at night), but that is a speculation on my part. You can setup more WAN ports from the LAN ones as your backup connection (ie. tethering from smartphone) which I actually used in the past.
For a but over 100€, you get very very nice router.
The only downside - thw WAN port labeled as 2.5Gbit is actually connected to routing chip at 1Gbit internally. I read this on some blog.
I have this router and three wifi APs from Ubiquiti and I wouldn't blink an eye if I had to set up my house again - it would be the same. Maybe I would actually buy even Unifi switch to have the whole network all-in-one. Alas, I bought Mikrotik for that role already (which is also a great piece of network tech).
If you want something that is boring and just keeps working, check out eero. It’s a top tier mesh system, and a pretty boring router if you want to tinker with anything. But since I installed it (also at my parents house) I have not had a single issue with it. In fact, I have some old nodes that I could send to you if you want to pay shipping (from California). They are quite old now, but they still work fantastically.
Strongly depends, given you mention not being super technical but also somewhat willing to dig. A lot of the recommendations you are getting are definitely from a techie perspective. Nothing wrong with that, it all just depends on how involved you want to be in the setup.
As a technical person I am not really a fan of 'consumer' networking hardware at all, but I also haven't used it in a long time.
I personally use a DIY opnsense router (previously a Unifi ER-X) hooked up to Unifi access points that mesh with each other, but i wouldn't recommend those to people looking for an easy setup either.
Need for mesh will depend on the area you want to cover. A consumer mesh like Eero probably isn't a bad option if you need easy setup and to blanket a lot of area in coverage. Often this consists of a hardwired router/access point and then one or two other access points that talk back to that main point and to each other to 'extend' your network. Sort of think of it as a more pro/refined version of wifi 'extenders' (this is a massive oversimplification but that's okay)
For just a basic router+wifi, i am sure most off-the-shelf consumer stuff will get the job done it's just that it might become annoying or restrictive the moment you want to go a bit more technical with your settings or how you want your network to look. Higher end models of these may have better internals, more features, etc but they often can be bloated / annoyingly loaded with a bunch of crap you don't need. A lot of these can be crappy or have security issues that don't always get updates often enough, etc. it's sort-of all one big mess.
If you can go partially technical and go with something somewhat prosumer (like, consumer-marketed stuff made by more pro brands) you might find a good middle ground, I am just not exactly sure the best options that fit that exact need. I haven't used the Unifi Dream Router but things like that might be the realm I am talking about
One of the things I will say for some of the prosumer or semi-pro stuff, sometimes a benefit of these is they are robust enough that even if your initial setup requires technical know-how and some frustration- they often are rock solid once they're going. So the upfront investment is a bit of getting your hands dirty but then they carry on without needing much maintenance.
Consumer wifi routers i have had tons of problems with (overheating, needing to reboot periodically, not being given access to even some basic settings, etc) so i jumped ship from those a long time ago though things like OpenWRT do rescue a lot of those
I have a similar-ish use case and the one I went with was Asus TUF BE9400.
Honestly, it got the job done for me and a nice bonus was that my old router was also from ASUS (came with my previous router provider) and it was super easy to setup a wireless mesh over them as well.
Something to keep in mind as you decide:
Not to hijack but is TPLink a big no-no?