WiFi Strength Different on Apple Devices

My recommendation would be to get a new Xfinity Modem as they are provided free from Xfinity because you pay to lease them. After that set up a 5Ghz only WiFi network on that modem and use that to connect your devices. The problem with older modems is that they frequently use 2.4Ghz for WiFi connections and that band is severely limited with multiple devices connected as the channels overlap and are susceptible to interference that degrades connectivity.

The newer modem might have different Wi-Fi capabilities that could affect the signal strength on your devices. Try restarting the modem, moving it to a more central location or using a Wi-Fi extender to improve the signal in the craft room.

If you did just get one from Xfinity recently, then you likely did get the latest. You will just need to create a 5Ghz only Network on that router and connect your devices to that Network. On my Xfinity router I created 2 WiFi networks for devices that may not support 5Ghz, such as some printers or IoT devices. So they are named something like MyNetwork and MyNetwork5, so I know the difference.

How you do that will depend on the Xfinity router you received, as they use many. Most of the time that is done using the Xfinity app on your device, but I was able to do that by connecting it to my Mac and accessing the router configuration page.

Walls can affect wi-fi signals. Who knows what’s in the wall? Rather than buying a new modem which might not fix the problem. Call your internet provider and get a wi-fi extender. My modem is in my bedroom with an extender in the living room. I have 10 gigs up and down, super fast.

Run the shortcut here, and check your reported details:

https://github.com/intuitibits/shortcuts?tab=readme-ov-file

You’ll get something that looks like this (some details expurgated):

That iPad is getting well past gigabit network receive speeds too, even though the SNR isn’t great.

This’ll help you get a better handle on signal strength than will “bars”, as you move around the area.

I find measuring download speeds in different parts of the house is more indicative of modem issues than number of bars. I use fast.com because it works as well from old or new OS versions, and across my devices. It has the added advantage of not bombarding you with adverts like the Ookla test.

Fast.com gave me the opportunity to test our oldest iPad, a 2 running 9.3.5 that we bought in 2012, to a newer one—an iPad 5 running iPadOS 16. In the picture, both iPads are on the floor in the same plane as the modem and as equidistant as I can make it without having to disconnect and move one of our printers. We are signed up for our ISPs 300MB/sec down package:

Only their browser was running at the time of the test, and both were restarted before.

I should had said … explain the settings to the massive. Anywho… I’m on a very fast internet connection… 2.5 gigs up and down. My modem is in the bed room and I have a wifi extender in the from of the house. Now I have full coverage for the backyard and front yard.

Since I do a lot of live stream in 4K on the IPad. I’m thinking about for another $10 a month boosting it to 10 gigs up and down.

A I stated below if you are having problems with wifi in a room get a wifi extender from your ISP and that should fix your wifi problems in that room. Every wall the wifi signal to go through will impact the wifi strength. And who knows what’s in your wall.

In simple terms...

SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio) - comparing the wanted Signal to the unwanted Noise value. SNR is expressed as a unit-less ratio, and not an absolute value; higher SNR is better.

Signal - this is the signal level measured in dBm (a logarithmic scale referenced to 1mW). Higher numbers are good. As these values are measured/displayed with a negative value, "-50" is a significantly stronger signal than "-68". For safely, these being microwave signals, you are unlikely to encounter a signal greater than -10 dBm with WiFi.

Noise - this is the signal level of unwanted noise/interfering signals, also measured in dBm. Lower values for noise are good; as these values are also measured/displayed with a negative value, "-92 dBm" is lower signal than "-88", in this example being approximately half the relative signal strength.

Channel/Band - this is the arbitrary WiFi Channel number that corresponds to a specific WiFi band/frequency.

Tx/Rx Rate - this is the effective upload/download speed for your WiFi client, here expressed in Mbps (megabits per second). WiFi is a shared-ethernet technology, where available bandwidth is "shared" between all clients that are connected to the same Access Point/stream, taking turns to send data when the channel is idlel. WiFi can support multiple data streams, increasing the effective bandwidth for a specific client in a specific direction.

Or in simpler terms, your network with the SSID Dave is getting an excellent (excellent SNR) Wi-Fi signal using 6 GHz channel 213, and with speeds past a gigabit Ethernet wired connection.

The SNR ranges are open to debate, but an SNR from 20 and higher is usually workable, and an SNR of 35 and higher is excellent.

Higher SNR values usually means you’re looking at the router / AP / mesh, or any intervening structures are either transparent Wi-Fi, or are reflecting the Wi-Fi signals.

I ran mine… can you explain the result?

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