Quality before quantity

Not all apps make the same demands of your wireless network. An issue with restricted bandwidth may not be noticeable at all when you’re browsing the web or chatting with friends – but it could ruin the experience when you want to play online games and watch TV. So it makes sense to prioritise these applications to ensure that you get performance where it counts.

This is something that your router can take care of automatically. As usual, the precise instructions will vary between brands and models, but look for quality of service (QoS) settings, which allow you to select specific applications and order them by preference. This won’t improve your Wi-Fi speed, but by prioritising the most demanding services it can eradicate glitches, making your network feel both faster and more stable.

Certain internet service providers handle QoS at the network level. Plusnet, for example, uses traffic-management policies to keep user applications running smoothly. “Because we know the speed of our customers’ lines, we can tell when they’re reaching their maximum capacity,” the company explains. “We’re then able to make intelligent decisions based on these priorities, protecting their experience. [Let’s say] you’re running real-time applications like VoIP calls and video conferences when someone else in your office begins to run file transfers in the background. Thanks to traffic management, we can guarantee that your time-critical voice and video calls will be prioritised, so they’ll run smoothly.” The flip side is that those file transfers will take slightly longer to complete, but that probably won’t even be noticed – it’s certainly much better than stuttering and delays on your VoIP calls.