Slow Wi-Fi in your flat? How to fix dead zones in a 2–3BHK

Router placement beats everything else

Wi-Fi radiates outward from the router, weakening with every wall — and reinforced concrete walls can absorb most of the 5 GHz signal outright. The single biggest fix is moving the router from wherever the cable happens to enter (usually the entryway or balcony) to the centre of the flat, elevated on a shelf, away from metal cupboards and the inverter.

During installation, insist the fibre is routed to a central point rather than the most convenient one. Ten extra minutes of cabling at install time beats years of dead bedrooms.

Understand 2.4 GHz vs 5 GHz

Modern routers broadcast two networks. 5 GHz is fast but short-range and blocked by walls; 2.4 GHz is slower but penetrates further. If your devices auto-join the wrong band, you get either speed or range, not the right one for each room. Most dual-band routers handle this automatically with 'band steering'; if yours doesn't, keeping both bands under the same network name usually lets devices switch sensibly.

When to use mesh — and when it's overkill

For a typical 2BHK, one well-placed dual-band router covers everything. For a 3BHK across a long floor plate, duplex or floors of a PG, a mesh system (two or three nodes that hand devices off seamlessly) is the proper fix — far better than cheap 'repeaters', which halve bandwidth and create separate networks that devices cling to incorrectly.

On gigabit plans a Wi-Fi 6 mesh matters even more: older Wi-Fi 5 hardware physically can't deliver gigabit speeds wirelessly, so the router becomes the bottleneck rather than the plan.

How to tell if it's the Wi-Fi or the broadband

Run a speed test twice: once on a phone standing next to the router, once from the problem room. If the near-router number matches your plan but the bedroom number collapses, it's Wi-Fi — fix placement or add mesh. If the number is low even next to the router, test on a laptop with an ethernet cable; if it's still low, that's a genuine broadband fault and your ISP should resolve it, not talk you into a bigger plan.

A good local ISP will help with this diagnosis instead of deflecting. Skynet installs include Wi-Fi setup and placement advice, and the 1 Gbps plan ships with a Wi-Fi 6 mesh — but the physics above apply on any provider.