Best WiFi Extender Recommendations

 

What Is a WiFi Range Extender?

We've all experienced it—one minute you're happily streaming your favorite podcast, playing an online game, or talking on FaceTime, and the next you stumble into a WiFi dead zone—then everything stops. Every other room in the house gets a full signal, but for some reason, the WiFi just doesn't want to reach the one you’re in. When other troubleshooting steps fail to improve your connection, a WiFi range extender or may be able to give you the boost you need.

3 WiFi Extender Recommendations

If you've done your research and decided a WiFi extender is what you need, the next step is choosing one. To help you with your search, we've selected three WiFi extenders that stand out based on the opinions from around the Internet, specifications, and user reviews (with the help of FakeSpot to weed out suspicious reviews). For this list, we're focusing on wireless extenders that would make sense for home or small business use.

TPLink RE650

The dual-band RE650 WiFI range extender can act as a wireless extender or WAP (in AP mode). It supports 4×4 MU-MIMO to simultaneously transfer data to multiple devices (clients must support 4×4 MU-MIMO). Beamforming allows the RE650 to send targeted signals to improve connection strength for select devices.

Overall online feedback on the RE, there are plenty of users with a positive experience with the RE650, and the overall 3.9-star Amazon rating holds up on FakeSpot as well.

NETGEAR EX3700

Chances are, if you're looking into getting a WiFi extender, you don't want to break the bank. The EX3700 is a popular dual-band wireless extender available for around $40 at the time of this writing. It still supports 802.11ac, as well as 802.11b/g/n, despite the lower price tag.

It doesn't offer beamforming, MU-MIMO, or comparable technologies you might find in more expensive extenders. However, if you're looking for a lower budget option, EX3700 specifications and user reviews hold up well.

NETGEAR EX7700

The EX7700 is a tri-band WiFi extender, and one of the bands is a dedicated link for backhaul to the router. This approach to extending WiFi can help limit the throughput loss with other extenders. Additionally, the EX7700 supports WiFi mesh and NETGEAR's FastLane3 technology.

One red flag that stuck out to us was FakeSpot indicated a high number of unreliable reviews for the EX7700's Amazon and Walmart pages. However, some users have reported success with the EX7700, and it has features that set it apart from many other WiFi extenders.

WiFi Extenders are Absolutely Worth It (Usually)

If you understand the tradeoffs and use cases where wireless extenders make sense, wireless extenders can be a practical fix to a real problem. The key is knowing when a WiFi extender makes sense and when it doesn't. Cost, performance, and your requirements will all come into play.