If video calls run perfectly in one room but stutter two doors down, you are not imagining it. Wi-Fi signal weakens quickly with distance and building materials, and most offices are set up in ways that make it worse. Here is what actually causes those dead spots and what genuinely fixes them.
Wi-Fi is a radio signal, and every wall it passes through takes a chunk out of it. A standard plasterboard stud wall might cost you 3 to 5 dB of signal, which is manageable. Brick or blockwork can cost 10 dB or more per wall, and anything with foil-backed insulation, steel framing or a concrete floor can block the signal almost entirely. Many older buildings around Ilkeston and the wider Erewash area have solid brick internal walls, which explains why signal falls off a cliff between rooms in a way it would not in a modern lightweight office fit-out.
The frequency band matters too. The 5 GHz band is faster but struggles through walls, while 2.4 GHz travels further but is slower and far more congested. So the room next to the router may enjoy fast 5 GHz speeds while the back office silently drops to a crowded 2.4 GHz connection at a tenth of the speed, on the same network name.
Most routers sit wherever the broadband line enters the building, often a corner cupboard, a comms cabinet or the floor behind a desk. From there the signal has to fight through the maximum number of obstacles to reach the far side of the building. Mounting the router or access point high and central, away from metal cabinets and radiators, can make a noticeable difference on its own.
Interference is the other quiet killer. Microwaves, DECT cordless phones, CCTV transmitters and neighbouring businesses' networks all compete for the same airwaves. In a shared building or on an industrial estate, a dozen networks can be shouting over each other on overlapping channels, and your speed in certain rooms collapses at busy times of day even though the signal bars look fine.
Start with the free options. Reposition the router as high and central as you can. Log into its settings and check it is not stuck on a congested channel; most modern routers can scan and pick a clear one automatically. If your router is more than five or six years old, it likely predates Wi-Fi 6 and a replacement alone can improve range and how well it handles multiple devices.
Be cautious with plug-in Wi-Fi repeaters. They rebroadcast a weak signal, so they typically halve your speed while extending coverage, and they add lag that makes video calls worse. Powerline adapters, which send data through your mains wiring, are hit and miss in older buildings, particularly where different rooms sit on separate ring circuits. Both are fine as a stopgap, but neither is a proper fix for a business that depends on its connection.
The reliable solution is to run a data cable from your router or switch to a ceiling-mounted wireless access point in the area with poor coverage. Because the access point gets its data over the cable rather than by relaying a weak wireless signal, you get full speed in that room, not a diluted repeat of it. A typical small office needs one or two access points; a larger unit with brick internal walls might need three or four, positioned based on a proper signal survey rather than guesswork.
Cost depends on cable runs and building access, but for most small offices a single Cat6 run and a business-grade access point is a modest job, often done in half a day. It is worth doing properly: cabling installed and tested to standard will comfortably outlast several generations of routers, and the same runs can later serve desk points, printers or CCTV. If you are in Ilkeston or anywhere across Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, we are happy to survey the building and tell you honestly whether you need new cabling or just a better-placed router.
It can improve coverage, but because it rebroadcasts a weak signal it usually halves the speed and adds lag. For occasional email use that may be fine, but for video calls or cloud software a wired access point is far more dependable.
A small open-plan office often needs just one well-placed access point. Buildings with brick internal walls, multiple floors or more than about 150 square metres usually need two or more, and a quick signal survey will pinpoint exactly where they should go.
Usually not. In most cases one or two new Cat6 runs to ceiling-mounted access points solve the problem, and the work can normally be completed in a day with minimal disruption.
Tell us about your project, send any drawings or schedules, and we'll come back the same day with a clear, itemised quote.
