iPhone XS Max Weak 5GHz WIFI Reception

Install iperf on NAS and this app on iphone HE.NET Network Tools de « Hurricane Electric, LLC »

https://itunes.apple.com/ch/app/he-net-network-tools/id858241710?l=fr&mt=8

It will do speed test but anyway... Again if this is an antenna design issue... And they fix it in iphone XI I will be ****** off... Pretty sure that a one plus 6T is definitely better than the XS MAX... And also my 7Plus outperform my XS-Max when I'm 20 m far from the 5Ghz wifi router... What a shame

Same here.

But I installed iperf on my Synology with gigabit connection.

Results : both phones have same AVERAGE speed !!

It seems tools like Speedtest write down the fastest ever speed reached but average speed on long test with iperf both phones got pretty much same speed...

I will keep testing while I don’t have feedback from my diagnostic data sent to Apple...

Coasterman25 wrote:

I think it’s a big deal. It’s irritating that mine and my wife’s xs max’s consistently have a pretty poor connection on 5ghz and falls over to 2.4ghz. It doesn’t matter how close or far from the router we are. I don’t even let my devices connect to the 2.4ghz anymore, which causes some issues in a home with some smart devices like the roomba that has to be on 2.4ghz. It’s extremely terrible that this hasn’t been talked about more. Any search for this takes you back to when the device first came out and not much since.

Me and the wife both have the A1921 model. LTE is good for the most part, but the phone still would prefer the 2.4gh to the 5ghz 99.9% of the time. All other phones/iPads/ other devices that are 5GHZ at all distances in range run the 5GHZ extremely well, except these 2 phones in my home.

Well I have a slightly different view to offer:

1) In regards to LTE (I know you are talking WIFI) the 12.1 made a major improvement for my AT&T Xs in the weak signal at my house (12.0 was worse than earlier phones although never loss voice)

2) now to the point of this article: I have found that my previous phones (6plus, 7Plus, X) always had similar problems with the 2.4 and 5 ghz bands on my Apple AirPort Extreme. I have to admit i never watched it as close with the complaints on the Xs made me but similar behaviors of dropping to the 2.4 after I leave house and return with phones and having to select 5 manually. I also found my previous phones would drop the 5 ghz when home when I got too far away with many walls (or outside with aluminum siding causing interference also. And again I had to manually reseleft the 5 ghz. Sometimes on 5 my earlier phones (7 & 6plus and X) would also simply loose the 5 and then connect to the weak LTE. I did not do speed tests and all the things people are doing with the Xs series but behaviors were similar. So my personal experience was my AirPort Extreme setup was issue not the Xs. So I wonder if I need new better WIFI router but I have a spare one around so cannot justiy right now, but no more upgrades to my airport will happen so I wonder if a newer router would give better results. From my reading the variables in home router setups and models seem to be as much issue as the new Xs.

Anyway those are my observations on the WIFI issue for what it is worth.

Russ

A preference for 5 GHz is not the panacea you think it is.

The whole point of having coverage on both bands is if the phone (or Mac or other device) has a faster, more stable connection on 2.4 GHz, it will switch to it.

For example, if the 5 GHz connection can only achieve a throughput of say 41 Mbps but the 2.4 GHz connection over 100 Mbps, it makes sense to switch to 2.4.

As I wrote before, I had the same problem with 3 XS and XS Max iPhones and returned them. Then my wife and I got a couple of XR iPhones. All problems with WiFi solved! Reception comparable to my previous iPhone 7 in my house. So went the next step and used Apple Maps on iPhone 7 for a couple of 300 km trips in rural Ontario. Toronto to Lindsay and back. Every time I looked the phones showed they were on LTE and everything was flawless with no drops.

We’ve kept the XR’s and consider our problems solved. As a bonus, we found that the XS Max was slightly too large for daily use, fitting in pockets, feel in our hands etc. But the slightly smaller XR is just right.

So we found our comfortable size limit in this years 3 iphone choices. We’ve got the WiFi performance we expected and, Extra Bonus, we saved $500 CDN on each of the 256 GB XR phones!

I did a DFU restore on my XS last night and then set it up as new. With no apps on my device I hooked to WiFi and same exact behavior. Won’t stay on 5GHZ, if it will connect to it at all. So I put the beta back on and restored from back up. Never changed the way the XS Max worked. My wife’s acts the same way so now I know that I’m not taking the time to do the same thing to hers and not have it corrected. Oh well, thanks for the update about the new one acting the same.

Agreed, the WiFi issue is NOT fixed. I finally decided to turn off my 5ghz so the silly phone wouldn’t basically go useless while it tries to decide which frequency it wants to use.

And I’m still waiting for a fix...7plus never did this!

I did several phone exchanges costing me time, gas, and screen protectors. I replaced my router and tested the phone on several access points. Also had 15+ hours with support - even allowing them to install loggers to get logs to help solve the problem. Not to even mention the number of restores grrr. The only thing that works for me is staying on the 2.4 ghz band. I don't get the speeds I should out of this $$$$$ phone.

I did get some compensation after demanding something be done. I wanted to go back to an X but they said I couldn't. They were willing to compensate me any accessory up to $50. I asked for a 30W power brick and cord so I could fast charge my half working phone. They agreed but I'm still not happy! The part I don't understand is how is there so many people not having issues?

As William shows, my Max achieves my Fios 150/150 service on my 5GHz band consistently. I have the bands named separately and I don’t let my iOS devices use the 2.4 band. As is well known the 5 has less range but in my apartment that isn’t really an issue. The Max appears to get the same range on the 5 as my iPhone 7. I believe many of these issues come from the routers. With so many people getting replacement phones and getting the same results plus others like myself having no issues there must be another problem apart from the phone.

Add me to the list of folks having this issue as well. I got my XS on the first day they were shipped out and noticed the problem first thing, so here's my quick story:

> i work from home so I sit in my 2nd bedroom-turned-office every day for 8 hours a day in the exact same spot.

> i have a router that spits out 2 and 5 GHz signals

> the router is at most 25 feet from my office in the living room. ALL my gadgets/computers picks up both signals with full strength in my office. i mean the router is so close

> my last iphone was a 7S and it connected to the 5GHz signal in my office with full bars. very strong connection, duh

> on day 1 with my new XS it kept dropping the 5Gz signal while sitting in the exact same spot as my 7S, in my office, where I have been sitting every day

> if I'm lucky i'll get it to connect to 5GHz with 1-2 bars, but it always drops out after a few minutes. however the 2GHz signal sent out by my router is picked up by the XS with full strength no matter where the phone is sitting, the same as my old 7S used to do with both the 2 and 5 GHz signals.

TL;DR: iphone XS struggles to pick up the 5GHz signal but has a very strong connection to the 2Hz signal. definitely a problem with the XS. image of my WiFI shown below on a good day:

The issue is very unlikely with either the iPhone or iPad. It's likely with the router or environment. I too have Xs Max and iPad Pro 11, neither of which are having any of the issues the poster referred to. Actually, we have two iPad Pro 11, one Xs Max and one X, and we've not had any Wifi or LTE issues at all on any of the devices.

I would have to agree. Long story short, 6 new xs’s and a 11 inch iPad Pro. iOS 12.1....... all the phones have erratic signal and everyday it’s hit or miss with connection. The last time I used my XS was yesterday and I ended up finally making a decision on keeping my x from last year. I missed 6 calls on the XS and all my iMessages that were sent to me using the XS was never delivered. When I put my SIM card back in my x, bam! Over 25 iMessages came through. Also people I texted on the XS claimed that half of my texts are going through as sms, not iMessage. Note that I’m right next to my 200 mbps router with full signal and full LTE. Strange thing is that when I was restoring the XS as new, I was streaming music from my iPad Pro and music just stopped. I checked the pad, NO WIFI!!!!!!!! Leads me to think it’s definitely software. I never had any issues with the iPad Pro. Seems like every new iPhone has the same issues just in different ways. Also to add, there’s a very small amount of complaints that LTE/WiFi has issues in older phones.... 6,7,8.....

After iOS 12.1.2, I tried a restore to get the 2nd release build, and I’m honestly fine right now. I’ve had my fair share of problems NOT related to home networking or “me” issues and everything is good right now. Carrier update for AT&T is 35

So I decided to try it again and ordered the phone (iPhone Xs). It's better than when it first came out, but still not at the level of my iPhone 8. In some places, the speed seems fine. In other places my iPhone 8 has 2x the speed.

I still see random connectivity spikes too. For example, if I move from one room to the next, it'll drop the signal down to almost nothing and then pick up again. My 8 has solid connection doing the same and never drops. It shouldn't be dropping in that location as there's little interference between those locations and the router.

The other thing I noticed is that it prefers to stick to my AP and not the router. In a specific location that's close to the router, if I start up my phone and connect to the base router, it'll be fine. Then if I lock the phone, unlock it, and then see what it's connected to, it connects to the AP which has a very weak signal at that location. It's like -80dBm whereas the router has -50 or so. So for some reason, it prefers the super weak AP and keeps bouncing me to that even if I was previously connected to the main router with the strong signal. Sometimes it'll figure it out and then bounce back to the strong signal and other times it'll just keep trying to use the weak signal. Similarly, it'll sometimes not find a wireless signal at all in the location and use LTE. Then it will connect, but connect to the super weak signal instead of the strong signal that's right there.

So overall, it's slightly better but still super frustrating and disappointing. When the phone first came out, i'd get 1/2 the speed no matter where I was at and lots more drops. Now it's a bit better, but I'm still having problems with it. Might be returning this one again and giving up....

I have same issue with my Xs max. Something wrong with the 5ghz connection. When I connect to 5 ghz the signal is too weak. I use the 2,4 ghz connection for better results for now. Hope the issue will be fixed. Here are my screen shots at the same location in my home with 2,4 and 5 ghz.