Subscribe to Xataka MobileReceive an email a day with our articles:Beyond the fiber or ADSL rate that you have contracted, there is a key element that distinguishes having a good WiFi connection at home or having a poor quality one: the router.As standard, the companies themselves send you a default WiFi router that does not always suit your needs, so it is always interesting to know all its features well.In this post we tell you how you can check if your router meets expectations, being able to see if it is of more or less quality.For this there are several sections that we consider the most relevant and that largely serve to verify if the device is really what you need or if, failing that, you should request another from the company or even buy a new one.Whether to obtain information on its handling or access the specifications as such, it is always interesting to have the router's user manual at hand.You can find this in the box that the company gave you when you delivered the router.This guide could also help you to check some of the parameters that we are going to see in the following sections.The most recent and advanced type that we find in the market is the WiFi 6E standard, which roughly shares many of the advantages with WiFi 6, only operating in 6 GHZ bands.However, we are still far from seeing this type of WiFi as a standard in routers, so it is likely that yours does not support it.Now, not having WiFi 6E is not synonymous with having a bad router.A router with WiFi 6 can also be supported today, which is beginning to be standardized in the latest routers.And, although to a lesser extent, WiFi AC (WiFi 5) can continue to offer good connection speeds, despite its more than obvious differences with respect to WiFi 6.Although taking up the WiFi 6 standard, previously known with the 802.11ax protocol, it is from this that we find advantages such as a speed up to 40% higher than that of WiFi 5, including the possibility of offering a connection in 2.4 bands GHz, 5 GHz and up to 6 GHz in some cases, thus being able to obtain greater optimization and energy efficiency of both the router and the devices that are connected, since not all of them always require the highest speed to fulfill their function. .If you are only going to use the router to have a WiFi connection, surely you do not care much about the number of ports it has.If we stick to the strictly technical, having a router with more or fewer ports does not determine whether it is better or worse, although it helps.And it is that the cable connection is always the most appropriate if we want to obtain maximum speed and stability in the connection.In the aforementioned router manual, the number of ports and their type will appear, but it is enough to take a look at the back of the router to check how many ports it has.It is common to find between two and four Ethernet LAN pins capable of connecting at speeds of up to 1 Gbps.In the most advanced, you will find special shots of up to 10 Gbps.Then, beyond these "classic" ports, you may find USB 2.0 or 3.0 ports, M2 ports, and even SD card readers.All of them are designed so that you can connect other equipment such as printers, servers or other peripherals directly to the router, being able to have them all unified under the same network and automate many processes.The best way to check if the router is providing you with a good signal throughout the house is to do different speed tests throughout the house.For this, your mobile could be useful, moving through each room of the house and comparing the data obtained in the different tests.It is evident that the closer you are to the router, the higher speed is intuited.However, finding very large differences between the rooms is a clear sign that the router does not have a good range that allows good coverage in each area.This depends largely on the position of the router and the number and orientation of its antennas.Of course, you should not always think that a bad signal and low coverage is always due to the router.In many cases it is due to the obstacles that we have at home and that make it difficult for the WiFI signal to pass through.In these cases, you can always resort to methods that improve the WiFi signal such as orienting the antennas, choosing another connection band or even choosing to buy a WiFi repeater that amplifies the signal in certain areas of the home.Perhaps this is the least decisive section to know if your router is of better or worse quality, but it is not a minor aspect either.All routers have their own interface to configure them, either through a mobile or computer application or by accessing the web through the IP address.In this interface there are several keys to know if we are dealing with good software or not.The first of these is the number of options that the router supports by default.There are no reasons to go around playing everything and even less without knowledge, but giving the user the greatest number of possibilities is always something to be thankful for.Similarly, the fact that the interface is intuitive and visually pleasing also adds several extra points.And it is that you can find a router of very good quality at a technical level and with many configurations, but if its management interface is tedious it could be a problem every time you want to make a change.In view of all of the above, we review in this final point what should be the minimum requirements to demand in a router in the middle of 2022. Always with a variable fork that goes according to your needs, but with these recommended minimums:Share What to keep in mind to know if you have a good routerMore Sites You'll LikeSee more articlesSee more videosAt Xataka Móvil we talk about...