Why 2.4GHz WiFi is the feature I loathe most in smart home devices

You could have run into this when organising a brand new sensible house product: You’ve put in its companion app, created an account, plugged within the gadget, and also you’re all able to go till you understand it gained’t hook up with your Wi-Fi. What’s taking place? You restart the app, the telephone, your router, and check out all types of different tips to no avail. The app refuses to see or hook up with your community. In some circumstances, you’re not given the courtesy of an error message; in others, builders are form sufficient to level out the problem: 2.4GHz Wi-Fi.

The primary time this occurred to me, I used to be organising the $1400 Roborock S7 MaxV Extremely. A watch-watering worth didn’t save this robotic vacuum from having an inexpensive Wi-Fi chip, and I used to be left questioning if it could ever work on my dual-band router or I’d must return it. (Spoiler: it really works, however that requires workarounds that I’ll get to later.)

I later bumped into the identical challenge with a few Xiaomi sensible house merchandise (the Sensible Standing Fan 2 and 360 Sensible Safety Digital camera), in addition to the Nanoleaf Canvas sensible mild panels, and Sensibo Parts air monitor. Every time, I needed to repeat the workaround to get them related whereas mumbling my discontent. I additionally needed to do all of that once more once I upgraded my house community and altered my entry level. At that time, the air monitor even did not reset correctly till I noticed my mistake and switched to 2.4GHz. The grumbling was even louder then.

See, I can perceive going with cheaper {hardware} decisions on a $40 digital camera, however something above $100 and newer than 2015 ought to assist dual-band Wi-Fi by default. Anything is simply stingy. I count on compromises on an inexpensive digital camera, I don’t count on them on a top-of-the-line robotic vacuum or air high quality monitor.

So regardless that this shouldn’t be an issue, it’s. I’ve put collectively a small information to clarify the two.4GHz challenge on sensible house gadgets and a few ideas and proposals to keep away from it earlier than constructing your sensible house or repair it if/once you run into it.

The two.4GHz Wi-Fi band is older and extra prevalent than 5GHz. Because of this, chips that solely assist it (i.e. no 5GHz, no dual-band) are cheaper and thus decrease the invoice of supplies for sensible house system makers. That’s the enterprise clarification for why some sensible house gadgets solely assist 2.4GHz Wi-Fi.

However from a usability perspective, 2.4GHz additionally has some clear benefits. It has an extended vary and might extra simply penetrate via partitions and ceilings — two attributes which might be essential within the sensible house. Should you’re mounting your safety digital camera open air, turning your lights upstairs, or working your robotic vacuum into rooms on the far aspect of the home, you want them to have a very good sign in all these locations and that’s the place the two.4GHz spectrum shines.

And though 2.4GHz Wi-Fi has a decrease bandwidth than 5GHz, that doesn’t matter a lot as a result of sensible house gadgets don’t want a relentless high-speed connection. Most of them are merely sending on/off and different easy instructions, so that they simply want dependable, low-bandwidth community entry throughout a bigger area.

Though 2.4GHz sounds nice on paper for sensible house merchandise, it turns into a little bit of a hindrance once you throw our trendy routers within the combine. A lot of them, whether or not standalone items or mesh techniques, are no less than dual-band. Which means they assist each 2.4GHz and 5GHz, to not point out some new ones that additionally embody Wi-Fi 6E and 6GHz frequencies.

As a result of 5GHz Wi-Fi is quicker, our telephones privilege it and keep related to it so long as they’re inside attain. And therein lies the issue: If a sensible house system can solely hook up with 2.4GHz Wi-Fi, its app throughout setup will solely view the 5GHz band your telephone is at the moment related to, deem it incompatible, and refuse to provoke a connection. Living proof, Roborock and Xiaomi gray out 5GHz networks on setup and gained’t let me hook up with them, regardless that I do know one in every of them is a dual-band community and helps 2.4GHz.

The web is filled with individuals complaining about this challenge on every thing from their sensible lights and safety cameras to their robotic vacuums and even photo voltaic panels. The difficulty is compounded when your router gained’t allow you to separate the two.4GHz band from the 5GHz one, which suggests you possibly can’t get previous the setup course of within the system’s app. Think about throwing tons of, if not 1000’s of {dollars} right into a product solely to understand it’s utilizing an older chip and might’t acknowledge your community.

The right way to keep away from this challenge?

The reply is straightforward. Earlier than shopping for any new sensible house product, you must test its spec sheet and see the Wi-Fi particulars. Not each producer will embody these, so a bit of additional Googling or digging into assist paperwork may convey the reply. Should you see 802.11 b/g/n 2.4GHz, the product will doubtless refuse to hook up with your dual-band community. You possibly can nonetheless purchase it and use it, so long as you’re certain you possibly can resolve the problem.

In any other case, any point out of 802.11 ac or ax, 2.4GHz and 5GHz, or dual-band Wi-Fi will imply that the product is okay connecting to each networks and shouldn’t trigger any points.

The right way to arrange 2.4GHz sensible house merchandise on a dual-band community

There are a number of workarounds to bypass this setup roadblock and get your sensible house system on the two.4GHz band. A few of them are fiddly and unreliable, others should not all the time potential.

Stroll additional away

Should you can handle to maneuver a number of rooms away out of your router, your telephone is perhaps out of the 5GHz vary and be compelled to change to 2.4GHz. Should you provoke setup then, your sensible house system’s app will doubtless see no challenge with the community and allow you to proceed. This isn’t a surefire answer as a result of your telephone may dangle onto the 5GHz connection till it’s fully out of vary.

Relying in your router, you may have the ability to force-split the 2 bands into separate Wi-Fi networks. On my Synology WRX-560, the choice is known as Sensible Join and I’ve to show it off to get standalone 2.4GHz and 5GHz networks. On different routers, search for choices like “separate,” “break up,” or “decouple.” Help paperwork or a Google search are your folks on this journey. Some manufacturers go a distinct route too, with eero for instance letting you momentarily disable the 5GHz frequency as an alternative of splitting the 2 bands.

Nonetheless, there’s one trick to remember. As a result of I need the break up to be short-term, I made certain the 2.4GHz community has the identical SSID title and password because the joint dual-band community I’d beforehand arrange. After I separate the networks, all my gadgets together with my telephone hook up with the two.4GHz band and I can arrange my new sensible house system with none error within the app. Then, once I mix the networks once more, all my gadgets reconnect to the router, choosing whichever band they like, and sure, that features the brand new 2.4GHz-only sensible house gadget. All the things simply goes again to regular. You possibly can see how the Sensibo Parts are Roborock S7 MaxV are on the identical community as my different gadgets, however they’re utilizing the two.4GHz band.

If this selection is out there in your router’s settings, it’s the most dependable one to make use of. You don’t have to depend on luck or undergo any headache-inducing processes to execute it, although it might take a little bit of digging to seek out it the primary time.

Arrange a 2.4GHz visitor community… or get inventive

In case your router gained’t allow you to separate the 2 networks, which is probably going a difficulty on some low-end ISP routers however also can happen on some good third-party routers too — cough, Google Nest Wifi and Nest Wifi Professional, cough — then it’s important to begin coloring outdoors the strains a bit.

Another choice is to make use of one other telephone’s hotspot as a brief middle-man as a result of some telephone hotspots may be 2.4GHz-only. So arrange the hotspot with the identical SSID title and password as your fundamental community (however bear in mind that a few of your different gadgets across the house will change to it except you flip them off for some time), join your telephone to this hotspot, arrange your new sensible house system, then disable the hotspot.

If that doesn’t work, there’s all the time the choice of choosing up an outdated, single-band, 2.4GHz-only router and utilizing it to briefly introduce your new sensible house system to the identical community SSID and password. In any other case, you possibly can all the time attempt to return the product and save your self all that headache.

It’s unhappy to see that we’re in 2023 — greater than a decade after the introduction of 5GHz Wi-Fi — and a few sensible house gadgets nonetheless don’t assist it. And sure, there are numerous, many different points with the present begin of sensible house gadgets, however not having the ability to join them to your community due to a stingy product choice is, I dare say, the most important roadblock of all.