Maybe you haven’t noticed it, but currently a the router can offer more than one Wi-Fi network. These networks operate at different frequencies and of course have quite different characteristics. Well, it is quite common for users to connect without looking and this leads them to abuse WiFi.
Before you connect to WiFi, you should know this
For you to understand better, currently the WiFi 5 and 6 routers offer two frequency bands: 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. Also we can have a 6E wifi routerwhich is an enhancement of the WiFi 6 standard, which adds the 6.0 GHz band.
the band of 2.4 GHz was developed in 1999
Until the advent of WiFi 5, the 5 GHz band was little used in the domestic sphere. Many routers, despite their power, did not offer support for this band before the arrival of WiFi 5. But, believe it or not, the band of 5 GHz was also developed in 1999
Now which one should I use and why? Well, the band 5GHz offers faster connections that the band of 2.4GHz. This results in reduced loading times, which is especially important in games where latency or ping matter a lot.
But, now comes the bad part of it and that’s cover
When should I connect to either WiFi band?
All routers, unless we disable it, natively offer both active bands. The 5 GHz band is easily detectable, as it is usually identified by the network name followed by “_5G”. This tells us that we are connected to the WiFi network on the 5 GHz frequency.
In fact, there are few cases where we need a 5 GHz connection. The first and most obvious case is when we play, because we need a high-speed, low-latency connection. This is also the connection we would use if we wanted transfer large filesreducing transfer times.
Since smartphone we can use the 2.4GHz red if the 5 GHz coverage is not very good, you will hardly notice the difference. The Smart-TV You can also connect to 2.4GHz with no problem, that shouldn’t be a big change either. It is also the ideal strip for devices such as smart plugs, lights or cameras, among others.
The reality is that connecting to either band of our WiFi network is usually pretty indistinguishable. This will be noticeable in games and heavy file transfers, but nothing else. So if you have a weak WiFi connection in the living room, since the signal from the router has to pass through several walls, you should still switch to the 2.4 GHz band, because you will have better coverage (theoretically).