How many devices can I connect to ATT fiber Wi-Fi?
ATT fiber provides high speeds for internet service connection with the help of fiber optic technology. This high-speed infrastructure enables ATT fiber consumers to transmit hundreds of apparatuses to their home Wi-Fi network without experiencing any lag. However, what is the exact number of devices that will bring some problem or the other to the network? So let us take a closer look at these three elements.
Total connected devices supported
Today majority of AT&T fiber plans include a Wi-Fi router or Wi-Fi gateway that can support more than 100 devices. For instance, the newest ATT BGW320 gateway offers a likelihood for 128 connections of Wi-Fi. Some of the older models can support slightly fewer devices, but all of them boast of providing internet to more than a hundred connections across their fiber gear.
So theoretically it is possible to connect up to 100 laptops, smartphones and smart TVs, streaming boxes, security cameras, smart home devices, and anything else you can think of. However, in real life, would you link this number of appliances to one another?
Again, I presented the distinction between ideal connected devices and the maximum connected devices possible.
Although you may have more than 100 connections supported by your ATT Wi-Fi equipment that doesn’t mean you should strive to achieve that. There are a few reasons why.
1. Inefficiencies will be realized – While the standards may support connectivity of very many devices, your Wi-Fi speeds are bound to be slow. Excess works on devices lead to network traffic and rivalry over who gets the bandwidth.
2. IP address constraints – To most home Wi-Fi connections, there is a limit of 253 IP addresses that can be provided. This means that if you connect over 200 devices, you can either run out of IPs or even go low in the process.
3. Interference – Some devices can interfere with your Wi-Fi connection mainly those that work on both 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz, including Bluetooth devices and the older 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi gadgets. This was even bigger as more devices connected to the Wi-Fi network, especially in the earlier days when a single house might have had just a few devices connected to the internet.
4. User experience – It is essential to ask yourself whether you really need or will frequently use internet connectivity in over 100 … of your home. Sometimes, it is possible that less can be more, especially when it comes to the overall use of certain devices daily.
Well, that’s the question of the day, is there an optimum number of connected devices and networks, that will not overload the system? According to ATT and most networking experts, the ideal number of concurrently connected devices per household is.
- Internet 25 plans consist of 10-15 devices.
- 25 Internet 50 plan-enabled devices.
- 30-35 devices for Internet 100-1000 tariff.
Well, I mean I do know that internet usage is not equal for all households; they greatly differ. Users with families where kids are watching videos in HD on multiple devices will be more challenging than a single user who is web browsing and typing emails. However, it is seen that maintaining the current Wi-Fi device connection count in or around the numbers above per account tier is ideal.
It is possible to always add more devices in the process and remove them when you want to. The greatest load of concurrent connections is during the evening usage which is highest in this proposition. Speaking of concurrency...
Concurrent vs Cumulative Connections
When estimating device connections for Wi-Fi capacity, an important distinction to make is cumulative vs concurrent connections.
- Lifetime - The total number of devices that have been connected to the Wi-Fi network at any given point in time. This could be hundreds of devices when the multiplication is done on the smartphones, laptops, and media devices that visited your home network across months or years.
- Current – This is the number of devices currently connected at the current time in a period when there is connection congestion. As far as capacity planning is concerned, it is the latter number that will be an issue as thirty devices streaming video will have a much more significant impact on the network than a hundred devices that are connected occasionally in a year.
According to ATT, most households have 60-100 total devices connected at any one time while only a fraction of those are active and demanding high bandwidth applications at one time.
Optimizing & Segmenting Connections
ATT gateway routers make optimizing many device connections easier via
Guest networks – you can set up a new network with a name and password only the guests are to know. This saves guests from monopolizing the data connection especially when in touch with their family members.
Wi-Fi band steering - This operates by identifying dual-band devices and ensuring they connect on the 5 GHz Wi-Fi band, thus freeing up congestion on 2.4 GHz. The more 5 GHz clients, the better the overall throughput the network is going to have.
Priority given to specific traffic – QoS settings enable you to allocate bandwidth to other applications which require more rigid latency such as video streaming or real-time gaming. This serves to moderate the large downloads.
This way, with a couple of adjustments, you can keep your family online without worrying about the total number of devices that have connected to your network at one point or another, whether it’s 50 or 100+ in total. Another idea is to avoid having too many simultaneous busy connections to the recommended ATT speed tier above to avoid some glitches like lags or buffering.
Extending Wi-Fi Capacity
If the house is very large with multiple rooms over different floors managing all these spaces with adequate Wi-Fi connectivity may mean taking the main router to another level.
Instead of putting a lot of pressure on one particular router to ensure all the rooms in the house have a stable connection, ATT suggests getting Wi-Fi extenders. For instance, ATT has available many mesh Wi-Fi range extender systems that are compatible with ATT gateways to provide up to 6,000 sq ft with strong 5GHz and 2.4GHz signals.
This accomplishes two things: It increases the overall Wi-Fi capacity for more devices by location and speeds up individual devices’ connections by keeping them attached to closer router nodes. In effect, the network supports more devices while each device on its own is optimally connected at the local level because of the distributed multiple access points.
These principles also apply to such very large homes with 5,000+ sq ft of living space Here it becomes critical to use a true mesh node router setup while ensuring adequate coverage over large areas. Once again, this eliminates the reliance on a single router that could be heavily taxed while providing for over 100 concurrent connections.
In conclusion, be sure to continue to have enough accessibility to Wi-Fi connection depending on the size of your dwelling or workspace areas. From there individual nodes, whether it is your main ATT gateway or a secondary satellite, should be capable of handling expected device densities within the coverage zones.
Upgrade to faster, more reliable AT&T Fiber Internet today! Call us at +1 844-905-5002 and get connected with speeds that keep you ahead.
