What You Need For A Stable Work-From-Home Connection

Plenty of people have made the transition to work from home or spend at least part of their week working from home. Home office internet has become so much more powerful and accessible that it’s made it possible to do just about everything you do in the office at home. But you need a reliable home network to make it work. What do you need for a fast work-from-home internet connection? You need adequate speed and bandwidth to handle the demands of your job. If you make video calls and use cloud-based software solutions, you need a home internet connection that’s strong enough to handle those demands. We are a preferred provider of internet for remote work throughout our service area. Let us help you build a reliable home network that can meet all of your remote work needs. Contact us now to learn more.

Essential Equipment for a Strong Connection

A stable work-from-home connection requires quality equipment that meets your networking needs. At a minimum, you need a modem and a router to provide WiFi throughout your home. Some providers offer combo units that combine a modem and a router. Just keep in mind that if you are buying your own equipment, you need a modem to connect to the service provider and a router to connect to the modem and generate a wireless signal. It can be tempting to use older networking equipment to save money. Unfortunately, networking equipment, especially routers, can become unable to keep up with the latest internet offerings and device needs. If you use older networking equipment, it could slow your connection down, fail to connect to multiple devices, and cause you to miss out on the full power of your connection. Ask your internet service provider (ISP) if you plan on using your own equipment to verify that it can handle your service plan.

Ensure Your Connection Supports Business Needs

The internet for remote work needs to be fast enough and have enough bandwidth to handle modern work tasks. These can include demanding applications like video calls, cloud backups, and large file transfers. If you don’t have a powerful enough connection, you will experience performance issues and possibly be unable to complete your work. One thing many who work from home fail to account for is the upload speed of their connection. When you use video conferencing apps, for example, you are sending as much information over the internet as you are receiving. More modest home internet connections don’t tend to offer much upload speed. If you use video conferencing and notice a lot of lag, or if your coworkers say your video is stuttering a lot, it could be due to your upload speeds. Choose an internet plan that gives you enough download and upload capacity to meet your needs.

Tips to Optimize Your Internet Connection

There are multiple things you can do to optimize WiFi for remote work, including:

• Place your router in an optimal location: Routers work best when they are in a central location, up off the floor, and away from walls and other obstacles.
• Use the 5GHz or 6GHz band for work devices: Newer routers offer at least two different bands you can use, including 2.4GHz and 5GHz. Some also offer 6GHz. The 5GHz band is used less than the 2.4GHz band, so you will experience less interference if your work devices use the 5GHz band. If the 6GHz band is available, use it for the same reasons.
• Reduce interference from other electronics: Some electronics, like microwaves, can occupy the signal band that your router uses. You can improve performance by moving it away from those devices or turning those devices off while using the WiFi.
• Limit unnecessary connected devices: Each device that’s connected to your network takes up some of the bandwidth of your overall connection. You can reduce that demand by limiting the devices connected to the network. For additional Wifi tips and support, check out our Wifi Support Page.

Securing Your Home Office Network

Network security is crucial for remote work and protecting sensitive data. If you leave your network unsecured or only secure it with a weak password, you are creating security vulnerabilities that others can take advantage of. No security or weak security can be an invitation to cybercriminals who want to infiltrate your network and steal sensitive data. This can lead to financial theft, identity theft, and other problems that devastate individuals and families. An open network can also entice unscrupulous neighbors to hijack your connection for their own internet needs. Even if they don’t do anything directly harmful, their usage uses up your bandwidth and leaves you with a slower connection. How can you secure a home internet connection? Use strong, complex passwords and enable WPA2/WPA3 encryption on your router. Also, be sure to update your firmware regularly to reduce security vulnerabilities.

Need a Stable Work-From-Home Connection?

We can help! WOW! offers great internet plans with more than enough speed and bandwidth to meet your needs. Get internet speeds and hardware needed for home business success from WOW!.