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So about a month ago I moved flats and one of the major problems I ran into in my new apartment was just how poor the internet signal was. The apartment signal was barely getting 10mps which was causing some serious lag times for my 9-5 job.
Luckily I managed to use the following steps to help me get a better signal to the point where I now regularly experience super fast speeds well in excess of 200mps.
Which of these tips is the best? And how do you know if you have a poor internet connection when working from home? Keep reading to find out more.
(Just a heads up a lot of people reading my blog are in the process of designing their own home office. If you want to save some of the painstaking time I did in designing my office, you can find my recommended products here)
Invest in a wifi booster
Easily the easiest and fastest way to boost your internet speed is by investing in a wifi booster.
Wifi boosters have been designed specifically to make you get the best speeds possible out of your internet provider. Maintaining a stable fast connection throughout your house without having to worry about moving closer to your router.
My own personal favourite has to be the TP-LInk. They are the unequivocal market leader in the industry and can rapidly increase the wifi signal in your house.
To read up more about why I recommend the TP-Link you can check out my post here.
Consider using mobile broadband
Remember me telling you about the flat move earlier? This was the direct solution that managed to 10x my internet speeds.
You see after doing the legwork and trying to find a better internet provider the best was getting up upto 20mps.
We all know that in reality those speeds were likely to be a lot less.
Cue mobile broadband boosters to the rescue.
I invested in the Huawei CPE which uses a mobile sim card to give you g and 5g internet speeds which are much faster than traditional wifi.
It was also super simple to set up, just pop in a sim card with a decent data plan and away you go. Since using it I’ve had no issues with drops in signals and can even connect upto 46 different devices.
What’s better is that you can configure the CPE to allow you to play games online too, so perfect for when you want to take those breaks from your 9-5.
Use a ethernet cable
A lot of us, (myself included), have become slightly lazy relying solely on wifi and forgetting entirely about traditional ethernet cables.
Ethernet cables have always been much faster and even though wifi speeds are always creeping up, they will never be as fast as a secure wired connection.
If my internet has been playing up in a week, I like to use ethernet cables as a way of securing me in if I have any big meetings that need to be held virtually.
Ethernet cables and you can pick them up relatively cheaply. My choice has to be the Amazon basics which are long enough for most households. You can grab it from Amazon here.
“1 in 4 people feel as though they are not getting fast enough internet when working from home”
Work in the same room as your router
Another quick fix if you’re unable to invest in any of the above or move your router is just to work in the same room as your router.
Even though I no longer have any internet connectivity issues, I still like to work in the same room that my router is in, ensuring any problems are ironed out.
Wifi operates through radio waves and so sometimes thick walls of other devices can interfere with you getting a quality signal, so why not move to the same room to avoid any potential issues that might creep up.
Consider going to a library
So if you have tried all of the above and you find that your internet speeds are still ridiculously slow for you to work from home effectively it’s time to visit your public library.
Most libraries have up to date in internet systems in the place and whilst they might not be as strong as some internet speeds, they are still strong enough for you to be able to work from.
A lot of us remote workers struggle with getting out much so why not hit two birds with one stone and get some fresh air in you to.
Just be sure to catch up with Your HR team if you work for an organisation first in order to make sure you’re not breaking work from home policies.
Visit internet cafes
Yes, these do still exist.
Internet cafes, coffee shops or other communal areas also tend to have very good intent speeds so why not consider going out to boost your internet speed.
This will obviously be tricky if you use an old school desktop PC so it might be time to invest in a new laptop – my recommendation has to be the Dell XPS 13 which you can read up more information on here.
Start with your written tasks first
Poor internet connection can be very temperamental and so in order to spread the risk one of the things you can do is try to start off with your written tasks first or tasks that do not require any internet usage.
You can then try to store up your internet usage for the time of the day when it is strongest and do that in one go.
For e-mails and the like you might be thinking you need data in order for these to be sent but you can still draft them up in something like Microsoft Word and take them from there.
Use your mobile data
Almost all modern smartphones give you the ability to tether your phone data for your device and so if your traditional internet speeds are low consider using mobile data.
I do this all the time when I am on trains for work and you will be surprised by how good the connection can be sometimes.
It’s worth noting that as mentioned above, if you do decide to go with the Huawei device you will need to insert a sim card into it.
In my experience it is best to go with an unlimited plan and the following two are what I would recommend for the Uk and the USA
| Best UK Mobile data plan | EE | Easily the strongest mobile connection in the UK for internet and is what I use for my current internet, They are relatively good when it comes to unlimited data plans at around £35 per month for unlimited data usage as well as the ability to gift data to other people too |
| Best US Mobile Data plan | T-mobile | T-mobile’s unlimited data plan in the US might be slightly more expensive at $70 per month, however you really are getting the best deal, being able to get full 5g coverage as well as international appeal get’s my top vote. |
Both of the above get awesome reception on the Huawei device so they would be my recommendations.
Disconnect your other devices
One of the main reasons I find people have poor internet connection is because of too many devices connected to their network at one time.
If you live in a house with other people or have a lot of cloud based devices it might be time to write a list of all you devices and then ask yourself the following questions:
- Are all the devices critical for you to do your job
- Do these devices need to be connected to the web all the time
- Which of these devices uses the most amount of internet
- Can these devices function without an internet connection
Run through those and you will soon find yourself only needing a handful of devices during your work day.
Speak to your HR department
If you work full time from home, and you need a strong internet connection in order to do your 9-5 there may be hope for you yet.
Ask your HR team if they would be able to help set you up with a stronger internet connection.
At the end of the day, they will be saving a lot of money not having you in the office with heating and lightning bills so asking them to either contribute or sort out your internet connectivity can definitely be feasible.
This should definitely work for those of you who used to work in an office by your employer but are now working at home full time, changes like this often require changes in contracts so don’t be afraid to ask the question of them.
Restart your router
The oldest trick in the book and with good reason.
Turning your router off and on again can sometimes resolve any lagging internet connections.
If your internet tends to cut out or slow down all of a sudden this can usually do the trick.
Simply switch off, take your plug out for a minute or two and then turn it back on again.
“10 mbps is now the recommended internet speed you need to have access to the web as it is today. This is likely to increase as more complex uses for the internet become unveiled”
Move your router
Again another super simple one if you have a portable router or loads of phone lines in your house is to simply move your router to your place of work.
If routers are placed in certain angles or the antenna point in certain directions then it’s likely you won’t get the best signal.
Heck up until recently my parents’ internet had a better signal outside than in our house because it was pointed towards the road.
A simple job but this can definitely have a huge impact.
Use ad blocker
Sometimes it isn’t necessarily the internet speed that is the issue but your browser speed.
Some sites take a while to load because of the number of ads on them so the simplest way you can get around this is by installing an adblock that hides ads on your site and should speed up the time it takes certain sites to load.
Use a different browser
It’s sad to say but some internet browsers load sites quicker than others. If you feel as though the speed you get are good but your browser just doesn’t seem to load things fast enough consider switching browsers.
So what is the fastest browser to use? Luckily I’ve compiled a list below:
- Vivaldi
- Opera
- Brave
- Firefox
- Google Chrome
- Safari
- Edge
- Tor
Install anti-virus
Another surefire way to pick up your internet speed is to install antivirus software.
If you use a windows based product it is a lot more likely your device will be riddled with viruses after spending a handful of time on the web which can significantly slow down your internet speed.
Instead, invest in an anti-virus software that uptakes yearly to rule out this possibility.
Speak with your internet service provider
Internet service providers will try to do as much as possible to do as little as possible for you.
If they can get away with charging you more for less in my experience they generally will.
If you previously had fast internet speeds when working from home and these have suddenly dropped speak with your customer service representative to threaten to leave, not only will they boost up your speed or send over a new router they may even reduce the price you pay.
Stagger your usage
If you are a night owl and tent to use the web between the hours of 9pm and 11pm you might find yourself struggling to get a fast connection.
According to Cisco research the busiest time for internet usage globally is between these hours and so you may want to stagger your usage as the day goes on to avoid peak perdios.
Consider a different job
Finally, and most extreme is to consider looking at a new role.
Getting a role that you can do working from home that doesn’t require less than 5mps will be tough and so you may want to look at more practical jobs that you can do working from home that don’t require the internet.
Now I’ve written a blog post that talks all about 30 jobs you can do working from home, but to summarize here are a few key ones that don’t require any internet connectivity:
- Basket weaving
- Make up artists
- Martial arts instructor
- Copywriter
- Proofreader
All of which you can do whilst being homebased that don’t require anywhere near as much data usage as you might think.
What causes slow wifi speeds when working from home?
Slow internet at home can be caused by a number of things including time of day, the area you live in, how many devices are connected to your network and if you use a lot of apps.
With more and more people working from home, in part due to the pandemic, keeping ourselves entertained and preoccupied when not allowed out has become a priority. Hence why you might find over the past few months your internet may have been slower than usual.
What are the best Internet service providers for working from home
So now we know what causes slower internet connections when working from home and some tips and tricks around how to boost your single what about your actual providers.
As mentioned earlier ISP can be notoriously difficult in offering more than then actually deliver. What are the best internet packages on the market place for us home workers at the moment?
My top choice has to be AT&T Fibre which has the fastest download speeds in the US and out of all the providers and gives you the most bang for your buck, regularly getting upwards of 200mps speeds. It’s fibre plan is also unlimited.
Any internet package you go for when working from home should have unlimited data caps.
To help compare other ISP packages I’ve put together a table below which should help:
| Provider Name | Speeds | Price | Why |
| AT&T | 75-200mbps | $35-$50 | Affordable internet that doesn’t really cut out, this one is definitely my top choice |
| Xfinity | 15-2000mbps | $19-$300 | If you can get the highest speed possible you will have the best speeds on the market place |
| Century Link | 15-940mbps | $49-$65 | An affordable internet provider with some fantastic speeds |
| Verizon | 200-940mbps | $39-$80 | Internet speeds that should be able to cover everything you need to do at home |
| Viasat | 12-100mbps | $30-$150 | Slightly expensive for what you get but the up time is pretty good. |
What kind of internet do you need to work from home
One of the questions we don’t tend to ask ourselves enough when working from home is what speed is acceptable when we work from home and how much data is used for the apps we use most.
I’ve compiled another table below which should help give some insight:
| App | Download Speed | Upload Speed |
| Zoom | 1.2-3mbps | 1.2-3mbps |
| Slack | 200kbps-4mbps | 100kpbs – 300kbps |
| Google Hangouts | 18kbps-3.2mbps | 18kbps-3.2mbps |
| Microsoft Teams | 30kbps – 2mbps | 2mbps |
| Google Drive | 3mbps | 3mbps |
So as you can see, the data usage is a lot less then you might think for some of these basic apps, a lot less then some of the speeds the above providers will give you.
What is a good speed to work from home with?
A good internet speed to work from home with is around 30 mps, this should allow you to communicate via video calls, access online files and watch video all with relative ease and very little lag.
Most internet plans will allow you to work from home without too many issues however you should always keep in mind the following:
Download speeds: How fast you can access information and websites online
Upload speeds: How long it takes you to upload files to the internet(if you need to take part in a lot of video calls this is important as it could affect your video or sound quality
Data: The amount of internet you are allowed to use per month (aim for an unlimited package which works best)
Is 50 mbps good enough for working from home?
50 mbps is a perfect speed if you live by yourself or with a partner and are both working from home. You Shouldn’t notice any drops in speed even if one of you is doing something that uses a lot of data such as gaming.
Anymore than two people working from home simultaneously then you may struggle but if it is just a basic internet package 50 mbps will be more than enough
Is 100 mbps good enough speed for working from home?
100 mbps is ideal if you work from home with a few different people or invite your friends over to work from home.
At 100 mbps you will have enough speed for a family stcu at home with everyone having good speeds to use the internet all day.
Is 200 mbps good enough speed for working from home?
200 mbps is more than enough speed for you to work from home with a large family living in a large home. 200 mbps is ideal if you do a lot of video calls or have a lot of devices connected to your internet on a daily basis.
What is a good data limit when working from home?
When working from home you should aim for your internet package to have an unlimited data plan. This means you will not get charged extra the more data you use.
How do you know if you have poor internet speed when you work from home?
The easiest way to check if you have poor internet speeds when working from home is by using an internet speed test on a site like Ookla to find out what speeds you are getting. They also have an app you can download to test the speed on your mobile too.
Poor internet speed when working from home during the Covid-19 pandemic?
So unless you’ve been living under a rock for most of 2020 you know that a lot more of us are working from home due to the pandemic.
With a lot more of us at home it’s only natural for internet speeds to drop with more of using data to do our day to day.
The good news is that more than 550 ISPs have signed a pledge to not disconnect or charge late fees during the pandemic. If you are facing slower speeds working from home then you would normally, try to give them a call to discuss and they should be able to help.
At&t,Cox, Xfinity and century link have also gone away with data caps which should help someone in maintaining a strong connection.
Is it possible to get free wifi when working from home during the pandmiec?
During the pandemic a lot of providers are also giving away free or low cost internet as a way of mitigating the crisis:
| Provider name | Plan | Deal | Who qualifies | Link |
| Cox | Connect 2 compete | 2 months free and then $9.95 after that | Families with K-12 children. | https://www.cox.com/residential/internet/connect2compete/covid-19-response.html |
| Spectrum | Spectrum plans upto 100mbps | Free internet for 60 days and no installation fees | New customers with k-12 and college students | Call:1-844-488-8395 |
| Comcast Xfinity | Internet essentials | Free internet for 60 days download speeds of up to 25mbps | New customers get 60 days for free all other customers get a boost to their speeds | Find out more here. |
What is the best internet for areas with poor internet speeds?
The best option for those of you working from home with poor internet speeds in my opinion would be opting for mobile 5g intent and using something like the Huawei CPE link as a way of getting fast internet speed.
When I moved flats this was easily the best thing I could have done to boost up my internet speed when working remotely.
How many people have poor internet speeds
According to a recent study at least 1 in 4 households believe they are getting poor internet speeds. Over one million people in the UK for example don#t have internet speeds that are anywhere near advertised or get less then speeds of up to 10 mbps.
10 mbps is now the default number you need to cope with modern day internet browsing.
Work from home without high speed internet
So hopefully this post has helped you get an idea of how exactly to work from home without a high speed internet or given you some options on what to do to boost your signal.
A lot of people reading my blog want to know what products I recommend for a home office/remote working. You can find out my recommendations here and learn how I make money whilst working remotely on the side here.
The content on this on this site has been written by Fehed Nicass who has over a decades worth of experience in sales and has worked remotely for the past 2 years.