Amazon's Newest Eero Router Goes Next-Gen With Support for Wi-Fi 7 – CNET
Amazon's Newest Eero Router Goes Next-Gen With Support for Wi-Fi 7 - CNET
Amazon’s yearly September hardware and services event on Wednesday featured the debut of a new mesh router for the Eero lineup, the Eero Max 7. As the name suggests, it’s meant to be a future-facing Wi-Fi powerhouse with early support for Wi-Fi 7, the next-gen Wi-Fi standard that promises to build upon Wi-Fi 6E’s expansion into the 6GHz band, with an expected widescale launch in 2024.
It isn’t the first router to grab an early seat on the Wi-Fi 7 bandwagon: TP-Link, Asus and others are making big bets on Wi-Fi 7 as well. Like those other options, the future-forward approach translates to certified splurge pricing, with a single Eero Max 7 device priced at $600. Two-packs and three-packs will be available for $1,150 and for $1,700, respectively, with devices expected to ship in time for the holidays.
As for the specs, the new Eero promises wireless speeds across the 2.4, 5 and 6GHz bands of up to 4.3Gbps. With the growing availability of multi-gig internet plans, as well as the growing density of overlapping Wi-Fi networks in crowded areas, there’s definitely plenty of appeal in a speedy mesh network that knows its way around the 6GHz band. Older-gen devices (Wi-Fi 6 and earlier) won’t be able to connect in that 6GHz band, but that also means if you have a new phone or laptop with support for Wi-Fi 6E (or eventually, Wi-Fi 7), then it’ll be able to use that 6GHz band like a members-only, VIP section within your home network.
For even faster speeds, the Eero Max 7 also features upgraded Ethernet ports in the back. Specifically, each Eero device features two Ethernet jacks that support speeds up to 10Gbps, along with another two jacks that can go as high as 2.5Gbps.
Like the last round of Eero devices, the Eero 6 Plus and Eero Pro 6E, the Eero Max 7 also doubles as a smart home hub for Zigbee and Matter devices, as well as a border router that can help manage and extend the network of Wi-Fi devices that follow the Thread protocol.
There’s no official release date set for Eero Max 7 just yet, but Amazon says that it’ll be available online and at retailers like Best Buy later this year, as well as through internet service provider partners like Frontier.