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BT has unveiled its latest wireless router, the BT Smart Hub 2 with the promise of a “strong Wi-Fi signal” throughout your home.
Available from the 27th of November, the Smart Hub 2 will form part of a new “Complete Wi-Fi” system, which allows BT customers to add extension discs to generate a stronger, more reliable wireless signal in all parts of the home.
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Features, price and release date
BT Smart Hub 2 specifications | Wi-Fi Disc specifications | |
| Modem Type | ADSL, ADSL2, VDSL2, G.FAST | N/A |
| Wireless support | 802.11abgn+ac | 802.11abgn+ac |
| Dual-band 2.4GHz and 5GHz | Dual-band 2.4GHz and 5GHz | |
| 7 x Wi-Fi antennas, 2 x DECT antennas | 4 x Wi-Fi antennas | |
| 3×3 MIMO on 2.4GHz; 4×4 MIMO on 5GHz | 4×4 MIMO on 2.4GHz and 5GHz | |
| Physical connectivity | 4 x Gigabit Ethernet | 1 x Gigabit Ethernet |
| 1 x broadband | ||
| 1 x USB 2 | ||
| Price | As part of a BT Plus subscription, from £65 per month | |
| Release date | 27th November, 2018 |
Key features
Complete Wi-Fi works a bit like BT’s Whole Home Wi-Fi mesh wireless system. In fact, the extension discs look near identical. Instead of having to buy the system separately and tether it to your router via Ethernet cable, however, the Smart Hub 2 has the tech already built in with BT supplying one extension disc as standard in the box.
Better still, the system comes with the guarantee of strong coveraeg, which means that, even if this two-box system doesn’t provide “wall-to-wall” coverage in every room of your house, BT will provide additional extension discs free of charge (up to a maximum of three) until it does, or BT will give customers a £20 rebate.
There’s a significant catch, though. The system will only be offered to BT Plus subscribers and with prices starting at a rather expensive £60 per month, plus an extra £5 for the Complete Wi-Fi system, that’s a high price to pay just for faster Wi-Fi.
Aside from the built-in mesh wireless, the new Smart Hub 2 has a new look and the addition of support for BT’s ultrafast G.FAST broadband. The rest of the specifications of the Smart Hub 2, however, haven’t been boosted over the original Smart Hub.
It’s still a dual-band router with seven internal antennas, supporting 3×3 MIMO on 2.4GHz frequency networks and 4×4 MIMO on the 5GHz frequency band. It still also has “smart” channel scanning, there are four Gigabit Ethernet ports at the rear and a USB 2 socket, plus support for ADSL, ADSL2 and VDSL2 broadband connections.
The same goes for the specifications of the Wi-Fi Disc, which looks to have the same specifications as the old BT Whole Home Wi-Fi discs. Each disc has dual-band 802.11ac, 4×4 MIMO across both 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequency bands, the ability to self-configure to establish the optimum mesh setup and a single Gigabit Ethernet socket at the rear for wired device connections.
We’ll be covering BT’s new Complete Wi-Fi system in full when BT supplies a sample set for us to test. In the meantime, though, if you’ve already got a Smart Hub and BT Whole Home Wi-Fi, it doesn’t look like you’ll be needing to upgrade any time soon.
