TP-Link AC1900 Smart WiFi Router (Archer A8) -High Speed MU-MIMO Wireless Router, Dual Band Router for Wireless Internet, Gigabit, Supports Guest WiFi

When I initially got internet service I opted to purchase my own modem and router rather than rent them from my service provider.That was a number of years ago so I was not surprised when my router began to show signs of failing.I had purchased a TP-Link extender so I was familiar with the brand. I did some homework on changes to routers in the intervening years and made my choice.I am very pleased with my new router. I no longer need the extender and my signal is strong and solid.

I replaced my previous router because it kept losing connection or not allowing devices to connect and wan to lan speeds were less than advertised. Tested with another router and speeds were ok, so I ordered this to have dual band and fix my wan speed.It's been working flawlessly, speeds are as advertised by my ISP (lan and wifi 5GHz), setup was very easy, connections are stable for the previous devices that had problems.I like how the network map shows me all current connected devices for both wifi bands and lan devices, and their up times.Recommended to update to the latest firmware as it comes with a 2024 firmware, to have the latest features and patch vulnerabilities.Guest and IoT wifi isolated networks from main wifi networks (both bands), home assistant easy setup (have not tried it), and easy mesh setup (haven't tried it yet).

I've had it for about 4 months now and it works great. It was easy to set up and the connection is great.

(DISCLAIMER: I am either a complete snob about what goes on my network, or I am using hardware held together by duct tape and prayers. There is no in-between. Take my niche experience with a grain of salt.)I needed something sub $100 to throw into AP mode in order to give me decent WiFi for a network isolated from my normal home network for work. After trying to make an eero work for way too long, this popped up for $60 delivered same day, and I decided to at least try it.Out of the box, you have pretty much everything you'd need to get started. The unit thankfully has wall-mount holes on the bottom, but if you plan to mount it high, make sure you account for an extra 2-4 inches of cable since the ports are on the top. Hard to complain about this for how cheap it was, but still not my favorite.Upon boot and during configuration, the wizard allows you to just switch to AP mode, which saved me some time. It does effectively everything you'd want a cheap router-AP combo to do, with a menu to ping or tracert.While features like Smart Connect (Radio bonding) are not exactly new, it's still nice to see them implemented in something that cost me less than a tank of gas would. I do SORT OF wish that access control had been opened up a little more - I'm sure that running in router mode allows for full usage, but in AP mode you can basically just block hosts. Again, not a deal breaker since that's what my actual router is for, but still a little bit of a bummer.Range is more than usable. I have no trouble seeing the SSID at far ends of the house and I've yet to find any unusable ranges without stepping outside. I'll be doing more testing and update this review once I can actually give numbers instead of rough estimates.Overall - For the price I paid, I'm happy. Especially considering some equivalents from Netgear, my usual go-to for things like this, seems to hover around $150.

App is easy to use during setup, router feels light (almost like cheap plastic) but works well enough.

Have been using this product for about three weeks now, works perfectly fine and very satisfied. The speed is fast, signal strength is good. Highly recommend this product if you don't know which router to buy.

Simple installation, superior coverage, I couldn’t be more pleased unless maybe it made the perfect iced latte’… but Amazon can take care of that too! You can feel confidant making this purchase you will be very happy you did!

I build computers and set up networks for a living, decided to upgrade my old router and test out this one before installing at customer's homes... It is a good thing I tested it first because I would have a lot of angry customers if this one I got was any indication of the whole batch.I don't review many things here unless they are unusually good or unusually bad but I felt the need to warn people about TP LINK'S absolutely GARBAGE support and quality control.So this falls into the unusually BAD category.Open the box and you are met with a shiny, but overly cheap light plastic router... It ran great for about 3 hours brand new out of the box... Then it started dropping 5G signal every few minutes on 3 different cellphones (2 android and 1 iphone), caused connection issues with MMOs and games and any online content on gaming computers and consoles, kept losing signal to 2.4g and 5g mesh extenders and Roku sticks.Gaming computers, consoles, everything was having connection issues. And this is with a BRAND NEW TP LINK ARCHER A8 ROUTER!!!Also, the only difference between the ARCHER A8 and ARCHER A9 router is that the A8 does not have a usb or router level VPN support.Even the cruddy spectrum router from my ISP could hold signal longer and stronger than this TP-LINK router.I'm sorry but this is unacceptable to either have this bad of quality control or just broken hardware BRAND NEW right out of the box... I don't care if it is even just a single defective unit and every single other one works, this level of quality control failure, and failure to update and fix bugs and other problems means I WILL NOT BUY ANY MORE TP-LINK PRODUCTS.Decided to mess around with settings and test everything for about a week while I waited for a "renewed" (open box, used) NETGEAR Nighthawk Smart WiFi Router (R6900P) that ended up being cheaper than this ARCHER A8.After about 3 days the 5G would drop signal for 5 seconds every 10 seconds! (and this was even with a daily reboot schedule that often failed and required actually power cycling the router) Then the 2.4G started having failure to load issues, the signal would stay connected but was so slow that websites and games would have constant server disconnects. Smart connect or separate 2.4 and 5G wouldn't fix any of this.It got the absolute worst when 9+ devices were trying to connect to it and no amount of QoS tweaks or port forwarding or NAT Boosting would fix it, even using MU-MIMO capable adapters on the 2 gaming computers still had constant disconnects.TP-LINK used to be pretty good years ago, but recently they barely support ANY of their new products, this particular router has had only one single firmware update in an entire year and it is still hopelessly broken.------------------------BOTTOM LINE:------------------------Avoid TP-LINK ROUTER PRODUCTS LIKE THE PLAGUE!Get a used NETGEAR Nighthawk Smart WiFi Router (R6900P) - AC1900 instead https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07C65K9H9/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 (CHEAPER THAN THIS TP LINK abomination)I plugged that NETGEAR router in and in less than 10 minutes of setting up and tweaking had a super stable connection that has not wavered once in days with over 15 devices connected from tablets to cellphones to 4k TVs to consoles and 2 high end gaming computers.