Wi-Fi 4 hub change.

[Bogleg]

Is there any downside to swapping out my Sky router for something more efficient? According to my settings on my PC, my "latest" Sky router is Wi-Fi 4. I've seen Wi-Fi 7 routers on the market. Should I change?

[Chrisee]

@Bogleg the main downside of switching to any third party router is that you lose the digital  Sky Talk voice line. It is advised to buy a router that is easy to connect to a Sky line which some makes like Asus generally are but some like TP-Link arent. The model you want depends on whether you are still on partial fibre or full fibre. 

While getting a WiFi7 capable router should help improve WiFi speeds it wont improve the connection speed to the line. There is a considerable premium for WiFi7 equipment over WiFi6/6e. The hub 4 is WiFi5 so tops out at around 700Mb./s over wifi.

[Bogleg]

My speed is that of knotted string where Sky can only supply a maximum speed of 41Mbps. Your reply also tells me that Sky is two steps back from what's available. Thank you for the answer, though. It's helped.

[Sayek]

Your 41Mbs is out of Sky hands.. I was using Talktalk 35Mbs for few years as that was the max Openreach could deliver via their copper lines.

I was lucky that Virgin media was also available so switched to them for 5+ years.

Openreach only recently upgraded their copper to Fibre so I switched from Virgin to Sky.

Sky is no far behind than  Plusnet or BT that supply a Wi-Fi 5 router same as the Sky basic black router. But with 41mbs you will hardly notice any difference upgrade from a Wi-Fi 4 router..maybe a little extra range. You can ask Sky and they supply the Wi-Fi black router free of charge. I  honestly thought Wi-Fi 4 routers are now being displayed at musuems.

[TimmyBGood]

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@Bogleg wrote:

According to my settings on my PC, my "latest" Sky router is Wi-Fi 4. 

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If that's reporting correctly then it's definitely not the latest Sky Broadband hardware...

The Sky Hub from 2013 is 802.11n (WiFi 4) and almost no-one should still have one of those in use.

The 2016 Q Hub and 2019 Sky Broadband Hub are both 802.11ac (WiFi 5) : the Q Hub  is being withdrawn this year as are all earlier models.

The 2023 Max Hub is 802.11ax (WiFi 6)

EE (for example) now offers a WiFi 7 Hub as a premium subscription add-on: their default model is WiFi 6.  I suspect Sky, as the largest competitor to BT/EE on the Openreach network, will be doing the same soon.