The 5 worst Wi-Fi mistakes slowing your nbn speed
3-minute read
Fast and reliable home broadband has become a critical utility and underperformance can have disastrous consequences for working from home, study, and entertainment – especially during school holiday online peaks.
Despite its importance, millions of Australians aren’t considering, let alone optimising, the equipment and home set up necessary to ensure consistently positive experience. To help shake this habit, we’ve broken down some of the most common network no-nos confessed by nbn customers to help others avoid network nightmares.
These are the five worst Wi-Fi mistakes dragging down home internet performance:
1. Underestimating the importance of your home equipment
Almost a third (30 per cent) of Australians underestimate the impact home equipment can have on internet experience, with two thirds (66 per cent) recognising this as very or extremely important.
This is a clear barrier to improving experience, as most (71 per cent) of those who don’t understand the importance of in-home equipment have made no changes in the past two years, and don’t intend to make one in the next 6 months.
Unfortunately, those who don’t act miss out on significant benefits, as 70 per cent of those who make a change experience improved internet performance in their home.
2. Setting equipment up to fail
Almost all (92 per cent) nbn customers have at least one element of their in-home set up that could be better. Only a third (34 per cent) had a good or great set-up, meeting three or more of the four key criteria.
The most common sub-par set ups were a Wi-Fi router that was not in a central position in the premises (59 per cent), more than 2 years old (55 per cent), not in a room with the highest level of internet usage (47 per cent), and not free of obstruction (19 per cent).
Three-in-five respondents (60 per cent) made no changes to their home set up in the past two years. Of the two-in-five (40 per cent), who have made a change, only 9 per cent changed the location of their W-Fi router in the home, and only 8 per cent engaged an electrician or cabler to add internet ports around the home.
3. Expecting old gear to hit new speeds
Only one-in-five (20 per cent) of nbn customers have upgraded to a newer Wi-Fi router. This can be a major drag on home internet performance, as older Wi-Fi standards simply aren’t capable of delivering high speeds.
The Wi-Fi 4 standard, which we know many customers are still using, can only achieve maximum download speeds of 100Mbps. This means customers using Wi-Fi 4 routers cannot leverage the increased speeds provided to millions of Australians through the Accelerate Great program. For many, this program accelerated wholesale download speeds by 500% to 500Mbps.
Even those on later Wi-Fi standards should consider updating older models, as technology performance tends to degrade over time. Among customers who did upgrade to a newer router, 30 per cent said it made their performance much better, and a little better for a further 37 per cent.
4. Choosing a Wi-Fi range extender over a Wi-Fi mesh network
Three in 20 (13 per cent) of nbn customers added a Wi-Fi extender to their existing network, and only 9 per cent installed a Wi-Fi mesh network, despite the significant advantages offered by mesh networks.
Mesh networks create a single, unified network that allows devices to transition between nodes positioned throughout the home, while each extender generally creates separate networks that require manual switching.
A third (33 per cent) of nbn customers who installed mesh networks said it made their internet performance much better, compared to a quarter (24 per cent) of those who added range extenders.
5. Waiting too long wrong before making improvements
Three in 20 (13 per cent) of nbn customers added a Wi-Fi extender to their existing network, and only 9 per cent installed a Wi-Fi mesh network, despite the significant advantages offered by mesh networks.
Mesh networks create a single, unified network that allows devices to transition between nodes positioned throughout the home, while each extender generally creates separate networks that require manual switching.
A third (33 per cent) of nbn customers who installed mesh networks said it made their internet performance much better, compared to a quarter (24 per cent) of those who added range extenders.
Source: nbn Customer Research & Insights
In Home Exploration (September 2024 one-off study)
Strategic Residential survey (Jul-Sep25); (Oct-Dec25)