How to Boost WiFi Signal Strength

WiFi signal strength is one of the most important things when it comes to wireless internet speed in general. Today, we are going to show you how to boost WiFi signal strength of your router and make your wireless connection available a little further.

WiFi signal strength can be boosted in several ways, including a software tweaks (free way) and by purchasing additional accessories for your WiFi router that may extend wireless signal drastically.

Boost WiFi Signal Strength
Wireless signal strength is one of the most important factors for your WiFi internet speed and access.

Physical distance from your router can impede performance and it is important to know what you can do in order to boost WiFi signal strength right now and increase your current internet connection speed.

Wireless Signal Interference (Free)
WiFi signal strength depends on several factors. Wireless signal can be interfered by your house walls, household appliances or even other wireless signals in your area.

Interference from other wireless networks
Other wireless networks in your area can cause interference issues with your wireless signal.

In order to boost WiFi signal strength and fix this issue, you need to know on which channel other networks in your area are running and choose the best channel for your connection.
Acrylic will analyze WiFi connections in your area and tell you on which channel they operate and with a signal strength values.

On this window, there are 2 sections you should watch at:

WiFi Channel – Shows you on which channels other wireless networks in your area operate.
Signal strength – A signal strength area where a wireless signal strength is displayed in valued from 0 (great) to –100 (bad).
If multiple WiFi connections compete for the same channel, it is wise to change the default channel of your connection to another.

Most routers are set on Automatic channel selection and in most cases this can do the work properly, if not – try out to change channel in your router settings and check out if your WiFi signal strength is improved.

Update Firmware (Free)
Most external hardware devices has their own software chip integrated in device itself. A firmware is a software that is embedded in a piece of hardware and you can think of it as a “software for hardware”.

Wireless devices, such as routers and adapters has their own firmware which helps them communicate properly with a computer or a device on which they are connected.
On your main administration area you can see which firmware your device has installed.
Check out your hardware manufacturer’s support website for more information on official firmware updates for your device(s).

Unofficial Firmware Updates
Unofficial firmware updates are not recommended and by installing these you might loose warranty and functionality of the hardware.
There are some free open-source freeware solutions and one of the most popular ones are DD-WRT firmware.
DD-WRT is known to boost up router performance and extend the feature set beyond what is typically offered by most routers out there. However, your router should support it in order to function properly.

On this website you can check out other free firmware projects.

Home-made Antenna Booster (Cheap)
In order to boost WiFi signal strength and range, the cheapest working trick is to create a custom-made device which might help you to boost up the range and quality of your wireless antenna.

There are some cheap home-made antenna booster devices which you can create in a few minutes, such as these below:
DIY Antenna Booster with free printable PDF template.
And here is a video of a home-made wireless antenna extender:
WiFi Antennas, Repeaters and Extenders
While some routers today actually comes with an integrated internal antennas, most of them actually have external and replaceable WiFi antennas which you can change whenever you want.

By changing a default antenna on your router, a signal power can be extremely boosted and increased.

Consider buying an high-grain antenna, which you can position and control the signal in any direction you want. This type of antennas usually have a larger range than regular antennas.

There are some other devices, such as Wi-Fi repeaters and extenders which you can buy. Repeater repeats an existing network while extender extends an existing network using a different name (SSID), which requires its own login info.

All of these devices can help you to boost WiFi signal strength and help you browse the internet with more comfort.