Router manufacturers won't tell you why their speed ratings are physically impossible

Published Aug 7, 2026, 10:00 AM EDT Maker, meme-r, and unabashed geek, Joe has been writing about technology since starting his career in 2018 at KnowTechie. He's covered everything from Apple to apps and crowdfunding and loves getting to the bottom of complicated topics. In that time, he's also written for SlashGear and numerous corporate clients before finding his home at XDA in the spring of 2023. He was the kid who took apart every toy to see how it worked, even if it didn't exactly go back together afterward. That's given him a solid background for explaining how complex systems work together, and he promises he's gotten better at the putting things back together stage since then. If you’re looking for a new router, one number will keep getting quoted at you. Alongside the rest of the technical jargon, there will be a large number that seems impressive. Maybe it’s BE22000, or AX11000, but whatever that impressive number says — it’s a misdirection. That number isn’t a single peak, but it’s the total of every band’s theoretical top speeds. And depending on your home devices, you won’t be able to reach those. It’s fine to use as a rough guide, but the first two letters are more impactful than the large number. The number on the box is the sum of every band’s top speeds Even the per-band numbers assume hardware you don’t own Selling complex devices like routers comes with a problem. How do you communicate which ones are better to a non-technical audience? That’s why we have Wi-Fi numbers to indicate which generation is in devices, rather than the specification details. It’s also why we have bandwidth numbers that are grounded in truth but not achievable in real life. We still use part of the specification, the two letters that indicate generation. AX at the beginning means Wi-Fi 6, while BE means Wi-Fi 7. Here’s how those numbers break down, in Mbps: AX6000: ~1,200 (2.4GHz) + ~4,800 (5GHz) AX11000: ~1,200 (2.4GHz) + ~4,800 (5GHz 1) + 4,800 (5GHz 2 or 6GHz) BE22000: ~1,400 (2.4GHz) + ~5,800 (5GHz 1) + ~5,800 (5GHz 2) + ~11,500 (6GHz) BE27000: ~1,400 (2.4GHz) + ~8,600 (5GHz backhaul) + ~5,800 (5GHz 2) + ~11,500 (6GHz) BE30000: ~1,400 (2.4GHz) + ~5,800 (5GHz) + ~11,500 (6GHz 1) + ~11,500 (6GHz 2) Your devices top out at half of the maximum (at best) Your router is only half the story when it comes to Wi-Fi bandwidth. Your other devices play their part, and none of them measure up. Wi-Fi 7’s 11,500 Mbps maximum needs 4096-QAM, 320MHz, and 4x4 streams; a litany of requirements that no consumer client supports. The fastest Wi-Fi 6E and Wi-Fi 7 clients I’ve seen come with 2x2 streams, which instantly halves your theoretical maximum. And that’s only when one device is connected to your Wi-Fi. With two devices, each gets half that bandwidth. When you have ten devices active simultaneously, each gets a tenth of the maximum available. Eero Max 7 9/10 Range 2,500 square feet Wi-Fi Bands 2.4GHz, 5GHz, 6Ghz The Eero Max 7 is a powerful Wi-Fi 7 mesh router that comes with Eero's easy setup and security. Physics and protocol overhead take half before your phone takes the rest MLO was supposed to make the numbers honest, but it’s not there yet Your Wi-Fi ratings will never hold up in your home, as the bandwidth of any given Wi-Fi band gets complicated. That’s in stark contrast to wired networking, which will be very close to the rated number, as shielded network cables are efficient at passing signals. Wireless transmissions are affected by interference and other overheads, so you should temper your expectations when testing speeds. Even Cisco puts aggregate Wi-Fi throughput at 50% or less of the advertised rate. The first reason is that Wi-Fi is half-duplex, meaning data is transmitted in one direction at a time, using only a portion of the bandwidth. That’s the instant drop to 50% of the rated speed, and then you have other overheads like TCP/IP and Ethernet framing, CSMA/CA channel-access, 802.11 management and control frames, retransmissions, and so on. That’s only the protocol overhead, without accounting for the physics of radio-frequency transmission. Things like distance, multipath, and wall penetration all play a part and often mean your devices need to shift from the 6GHz band to the 5GHz band, and sometimes to the 2.4GHz band, reducing bandwidth each time in favor of connectivity. Wi-Fi 7's MLO was designed to allow clients to connect to two or more bands via a bonded SSID. If that sounds similar to Link Aggregation on wired networking, you’re not wrong. The problem is that it doesn’t always work, or it only works on 5GHz bands, not on a combination of 5GHz and 6GHz. Also, not many devices support MLO, and even fewer support simultaneous Tx and Rx (STR) MLO. This will never survive a lawsuit The small print is the get-out clause While misleading marketing often gets its day in court and wins, Wi-Fi numbers are a different story. Not that they haven’t been litigated, because Shepherd v. Belkin did just that, but the case was compelled into confidential arbitration thanks to a clickwrap EULA. The practice has never been tested on the merits, only pushed out of sight thanks to overarching user agreements that nobody reads on their router. It would likely survive in court, as every marketing piece has a footnote disclaimer attached. There’s always something like “maximum wireless signal rate derived from IEEE 802.11 specifications” at the bottom, and that might be just enough. Plus, the Wi-Fi Alliance says it certifies interoperability, not marketing numbers, and that those AX/BE labels are vendor-invented. The FTC does require “clear and conspicuous” disclosure of any speed claims, and the footnote might fail that test if following the spirit of the law. But it’s never been tested, and will be a tricky one to bring to court. The number was never for you; it's for the store shelf While that eye-catching number isn’t representative of real-world performance, there are aspects of the router's specifications to pay attention to. The per-band stream counts are one of those; then match those to your fastest client. And if you want to see real-world figures, read a few reviews to see where their numbers land.