There’s some weird shit going on with the Wi-Fi.
Previously, the signal would easily reach distant rooms and even the back door, but now it barely even reaches there. And it’s the same router, the same house, and it seems like nothing has changed significantly.
My significant other has already ordered a booster (repeater) because the signal has visibly deteriorated, but I’m wondering: maybe there’s something simpler that should be checked first?
Can Wi-Fi simply “age” over time? Does something need to be cleaned, reset, or adjusted?
First question: do you mean the actual signal got weaker, or just that the connection feels worse? Because those are related, but not the same thing.
@SignalHunter95 Hard to say for sure. It just feels worse in the back of the house than it used to. We haven’t added the booster yet — she just ordered it because the signal doesn’t seem to reach properly anymore.
Then I definitely wouldn’t start with the booster. If it used to work fine and now it doesn’t, I’d want to know what changed before throwing extra hardware at it. Could be interference, bad auto-channel selection, router placement, some new device nearby, neighbors crowding the same band, any of that. Crowded channels and physical placement are both common reasons for dead spots and slow zones.
I’d scan the WiFi environment before buying extra hardware. A WiFi analyzer like NetSpot is good for this because it can show nearby networks, signal levels, and channel congestion in a way that’s actually readable. If your router is sitting on a crowded channel now, that alone can make it feel like the WiFi “doesn’t stretch” anymore, even if the hardware itself is fine.
@Ok-Image6120 Listen, it really does look like that. We just got new neighbors, and I haven’t checked my router settings in ages.