You shouldn’t have to put up with a slow home network, especially with the amount of fast and affordable network tech that is widely available now. Whether you want high-speed Ethernet in every room, or want to break up with as many wires as possible, there are plenty of network upgrades that can improve your speed. Not only that, but newer networking equipment will also likely come with some useful new features, like improved parental controls or support for the latest security protocols.

If you want to extend your home network, you’ve already got plenty of options with mesh systems and extenders, but there’s more to performance than just coverage. If you’re looking to upgrade your home network, we are going to help you get started with everything you need to know.

5 A new router or wireless access point

Increase your wireless capacity

It may be the most expensive option, but upgrading your router can also have the biggest impact on performance. Older 802.11ac (Wi-Fi 5) routers or cheap Wi-Fi 6 routers weren’t built with a ton of capacity in mind. Even if they’re providing enough speed for one device at a time, they may struggle with multiple simultaneous connections. If you’ve got multiple people using your network at once, or you just have a lot of network traffic, you may have noticed that your old router struggles to keep up.

The best Wi-Fi routers, especially high-end Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 7 routers, are built to handle many more devices at once with MU-MIMO, as well as more and wider wireless channels. For example, an entry-level AX1800 Wi-Fi 6 router supports up to 1201Mbps at once on the 5GHz band, which is plenty fast for a single device, but if you’ve got multiple devices trying to use Wi-Fi at once, it can bog things down. Getting a router with a wider 160MHz band and 2402Mbps (5880Mbps with Wi-Fi 7) at 5GHz can not only increase your overall throughput but help it keep up with multiple devices better.

Another big upgrade with Wi-Fi 6E and Wi-Fi 7 is the addition of the 6GHz band. There’s a lot more spectrum available at 6GHz compared to 2.4GHz and 5GHz, so the more devices you can move over to those bands, the better. This frees up space on the 5GHz bands, reducing congestion and allowing older devices with no 6GHz support to make the most of the available bandwidth.

A new router will also support the latest wireless security protocols, like WPA-3. While WPA-2 is very secure, especially compared to WPA and WEP, WPA-3 is still a big upgrade. It’s very unlikely you’ll be moving over to WPA-3 completely any time soon unless you want to upgrade all of your client devices.

Newer routers will also get software updates that can fix security flaws, bugs, and improve performance. Setup and management have also gotten quite easy with apps and easily available remote management. If you’re a gamer or working from home, you’ll want to set up a QoS to keep the most important traffic flowing smoothly.

4 Upgrade your Wi-Fi card

Most desktops and some laptops can be upgraded

Getting a new router is all well and good, but if you’re connecting to it with an aging client, you may not see any improvement at all. Most desktops and some laptops make it fairly straightforward to upgrade their Wi-Fi modules with just a few screws and a couple of antenna wire connections. Some high-end Wi-Fi 5 cards are still performing well today, with some even offering 3x3 and 4x4 MIMO giving them top speeds of 1300Mbps and 1750Mbps respectively, but most will top out at around 867Mbps. These ratings reflect the highest possible speeds too, whereas real-world results are likely to be much slower.

Pick up one of the best Wi-Fi cards for your desktop PC to make sure you’re getting the best speeds available. You could even get one with external antenna for improved performance, as we saw in our Asus PCE-AXE59BT review. Depending on your laptop model, you may also be able to upgrade to a newer version of Wi-Fi if the card is accessible. Some laptops are easier to take apart than others, so your mileage will vary.

3 Ethernet (where possible)

Wired is always more reliable

One of the biggest impacts on the speed of your network is congestion. Routers can easily handle multiple devices at once, but there’s only so much speed to go around. If you’ve got some devices near enough to the router, or you don’t mind running some Ethernet to other parts of your home, you can free up some wireless capacity while improving the speed of the newly wired device.

You might already have a few Ethernet cables lying around, and as long as they’re in good condition with Cat 5E or newer cable, they should be able to support gigabit speeds well. If you need some new cables, the best Ethernet cables come in a variety of lengths and colors, so you can find one that works well in your home. There are even flat cables that can be run along the baseboards of the room, or under carpets to get Ethernet into another room without needing to break out the power drill.

2 Faster wired switch

Stop using that aging switch

To go with your new Ethernet cables, you might want to upgrade your Ethernet switch. If you use your router as your primary switch, you’ll get a better switch with an upgraded router; but if you’ve got a more complicated network setup with a switch at the core, it could be the right time to upgrade that switch. Newer switches support fast speeds with 2.5Gbps Ethernet (2.5GbE) becoming a lot more common in consumer equipment. Some switches have even moved to 10GbE on multiple ports, with SFP+ connections available for fiber.

1 A new modem

Upgraded speeds require the latest DOCSIS 3.1 modems

If you’ve got cable internet and a fast plan, you may need a new modem to get your full speed. If you rent your modem from the ISP, proper equipment should be provided to meet your need for speed. On the other hand, if your equipment is a few years old, it may be worth the call to see about getting an upgraded gateway.

If you own your modem, you can upgrade with one of the best router-modem combos, or if you want to use a separate router, you can pick up a standalone modem. Make sure you check your ISP's support documentation to find a list of compatible modems to make sure the one you want will work properly on the ISP’s network. Modems will advertise their top speeds, but depending on how the ISP has set up its network, modems can have different levels of performance on different ISPs.

Where should you start?

When you start upgrading your network, it’s important to think about bottlenecks. A network is only as fast as the slowest connection between the client and the server it’s connecting to. This slowest connection is your bottleneck and the best place to start to improve performance. For example, if you sign up for gigabit internet but only have a router that supports 100Mbps Ethernet, the slow Ethernet connection is your bottleneck.

For most people, an aging router will be the most obvious bottleneck, with older Wi-Fi tech struggling to keep up with modern demands. Start by running a few speed tests on different connections. It’s also important not to get too distracted chasing bigger numbers. For most people, the difference between a 100Mbps internet connection and 1000Mbps is negligible. Trying to maximize your wireless speeds where you don’t need the speed can be a waste of money.

That being said, if you’re a gamer and you spend a lot of time waiting for large modern games to download, the extra speed could be a lot more important. It’s important to think about the best way to solve that issue, whether it’s running an Ethernet cable through the crawl space, upgrading the PC’s Wi-Fi card, or finally upgrading your router.