Most Aussies are using slower, outdated routers

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Around 64% of Aussie households are using outdated routers, which can significantly degrade NBN performance. According to a recent report from Opensignal, an independent organisation for analysing internet and mobile networks around the globe, this is having a big impact on the NBN speeds many people experience at home.

The report looked at the internet performance of NBN plans from Aussie Broadband, Optus, Superloop, Telstra, TPG, and Vocus. Combined, this group of providers cover 92.5% of market share, according to the most recent stats from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

In almost every case, most connections were using routers with an outdated WiFi standard such as WiFi 5 (802.11ac), WiFi 4 (802.11n), or WiFi 3 (802.11g). These technologies are respectively 13, 17, and 23 years old and aren’t suitable for many modern plans such as the now-common NBN 500.

Superloop’s users were the best adopters, with only 45% using an outdated router. Customers of the other providers who use older routers averaged between 58% (Aussie Broadband) and 72% (Vocus).

Time to upgrade?

Your router is owned by you and isn’t the responsibility of your internet provider or NBN Co, meaning you’d need to foot the bill for an upgrade. So how much of a performance drop are we talking about here?

If you’re on an NBN 100 or slower plan, it mightn’t be a big concern, based on the report’s findings (that said, if you’re using WiFi 4 or, especially, WiFi 3, you might still consider an upgrade). For the approximately 38% of households on an NBN 500 plan or faster, it can make a huge difference.

For example, NBN 500 customers using newer WiFi standards like WiFi 6, WiFi 6E, and WiFi 7 are typically enjoying close to (or above) the full 500Mbps downloads of NBN 500. But those with older routers sometimes averaged less than half that.

If you’re not sure where to start looking for an upgrade, you can check out our guide covering the best NBN routers. There are also some NBN plans with a free modem, albeit with some caveats like potential hardware fees if you leave within a certain number of months.

Alex Angove-Plumb

Digital Content Editor

Alex Angove-Plumb is a Digital Content Editor at WhistleOut and an award-winning journalist. He's been in the tech publishing industry since 2010, putting him a few short years away from the title of Grizzled Ancient in his chosen profession. He was an original WhistleOut-er before running NBN Co's corporate blog for two years, then moving on to a lengthy stint at CHOICE. Now he's come home.

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