Too many people are stuck on last-gen networking hardware, and the problems they face are intolerable: WiFi dead zones, network congestion, and outdated (if not end-of-life) security features. They almost certainly aren’t getting the networking performance they paid for with their recent PC, laptop, smartphone, television, or smart devices. And they won’t find answers to any of these problems in the limited network management options provided by their old router. If you’ve been looking for a next-gen WiFi 7 router, but need a mainstream option with a budget-friendly price tag, today’s your day. The ASUS RT-BE82U is available now, and it offers incredible value through WiFi 7 tech, intelligent AiMesh, and a rich feature set.
WiFi 7 gives you an out-of-the-box speed upgrade
Each generation of wireless technology brings something new to the table. WiFi 6 introduced tools to help routers better manage all the connected devices that we have in modern smart homes. Those refinements were welcome and needed, but in comparison WiFi 7 is a showstopper. It drills down on speed, giving you an immediate 1.2x transmission speed boost thanks to 4K QAM. This tech allows each signal to more densely incorporate larger amounts of data, boosting a single frequency band’s transmission speed and efficiency.
The ASUS RT-BE82U boosts your speeds up to 6500 Mbps, giving you a seamless experience with streaming, gaming, and productivity. That bolstered bandwidth is especially valuable for homes where multiple people regularly participate in remote conferencing, online gaming, or 4K content streaming, as it’ll help make sure that everyone has a reliable connection simultaneously.
To take full advantage of WiFi 7, you’ll need compatible devices in addition to a WiFi 7 router. But if you’ve bought new devices in the last year or two, they likely arrived at your doorstep with WiFi 7 support. Today’s smartphones, such as the new ROG Phone 9, support WiFi 7, as do the latest laptops, game consoles, and desktop PCs.
As a dual-band WiFi 7 router, the RT-BE82U lets you connect over the high-bandwidth 5GHz band or the high-range, 2.4GHz band, which also offers broad connectivity with existing IoT devices. Last-gen routers often offered access to both bands, but the experience wasn’t always seamless. While walking around your home, your smartphone might have needed to switch from one band to the other, creating an interruption in your connection.
One of WiFi 7’s marquee features neatly solves this problem. Called Multi-Link Operation (MLO), it enables your devices to link to multiple bands simultaneously, intelligently combining and switching between the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands. This ensures stable, buffering-free internet connections and efficient data transfers. The RT-BE82U is built to support all WiFi 7 devices, regardless of the MLO mode they use.
Seamless whole-home coverage, courtesy of intelligent AiMesh
For many folks, especially those who live in an apartment or condo, a single ASUS RT-BE82U router will be sufficient to provide reliable signal to every room. Thanks to its four external antennas and six high-power front-end modules, it delivers up to 2500 square feet of coverage.
If you live in a larger home, especially one with multiple stories or dense construction materials, you might need a solution for extending your network coverage. Built-in ASUS AiMesh technology allows you to use the RT-BE82U along with another AiMesh-compatible router to create one seamless whole-home network. WiFi 7 MLO takes this tech to the next level, allowing it to provide wider coverage, a more stable and secure network, and a feature-rich experience for your entire smart home. For convenience, it’ll all be under one network name.
You might not even need to buy a second router to take advantage of this capability. We’ve been integrating AiMesh into our routers for years now, so if your current model is compatible, you can integrate it into your RT-BE82U network. This allows you to repurpose the older hardware, enhancing coverage while reducing electronic waste. Unlike some of our competitors, we even allow this functionality to work between our ZenWiFi mesh routers and our traditional routers like the RT-BE82U, giving you more freedom to mix and match as you see fit.
It’s worth noting that even if you don’t need to extend your network coverage with AiMesh today, you might in the near future. If you move to a new and larger home, if you construct an addition to your existing home, or if you need to improve your WiFi experience in a space like a finished basement or backyard hangout, you’ll need extended network coverage. The RT-BE82U’s AiMesh capabilities will be ready and waiting.
Wired connections give you flexibility, speed, and always-on internet
With WiFi 7 grabbing all the headlines, it might be easy to miss the upgrades that the ASUS RT-BE82U offers through its wired connection options. But these ports have a lot to offer for today’s smart homes.
The gigabit Ethernet ports that you probably have on your old router were once more than sufficient for your connection to your internet service provider. But now that multi-gig internet plans aren’t just common, but quickly becoming standard, you need a router that won’t bottleneck your internet connection. The ASUS RT-BE82U offers a 2.5G WAN port, helping to make sure that you’re getting the internet speeds that you’re paying for.
The RT-BE82U complements that 2.5G WAN port with four 2.5G LAN ports, letting you establish high-bandwidth, extremely reliable pathways for your most important devices. Today’s desktop PCs, in particular, very often have 2.5G Ethernet ports, so the RT-BE82U will help you get the most out of them. These ports can also help you establish a wired backhaul connection to another AiMesh-compatible router as you’re building out an AiMesh whole-home network.
For many homes, an internet outage simply isn’t acceptable. Whether you work from home through a remote or hybrid position, or whether you’re an online gamer who refuses to let a dropped connection keep you from victory, the RT-BE82U gives you the tools to get your tech back online if your primary Internet connection falters. It includes a USB port with USB WAN functionality that lets you use 4G LTE / 5G mobile tethering to stay connected during an internet outage.
Between the advanced features of WiFi 7, the latest network management features, and its high-bandwidth port selection, the ASUS RT-BE82U needs potent processing power to give you a smooth experience for all your devices. We equipped this router with a quad-core 2.0 GHz CPU and 1 GB of RAM so that it’s more than ready to optimize your network, both today and tomorrow.
Smart management tools built for today’s networks
To keep things organized, you need a place for everything, and everything in its place. That’s as true of wireless networks as it is of closets and kitchens, but traditional routers didn’t give you organization options. Every device had to connect to the same network, whether it was your personal smartphone or the phone of a guest, an IoT device that only needed a sliver of bandwidth or television built for 4K streaming, your personal PC or the computer that you set up for your kids.
That old paradigm of one router, one network name isn’t working for today’s homes. It’s disorganized, it prevents you from establishing different rules for different devices, and it makes it inconvenient to follow the best networking security practices. There’s a better way. The latest ASUS WiFi 7 routers, including the RT-BE82U, offer Smart Home Master. Through this technology, you can set up multiple SSIDs with one router so that you have different subnetworks for your different categories of devices.
If you have kids, you’ll love how Smart Home Master makes advanced parental controls effortless. Typically, parents have to set up screen times and content controls individually for each device that their kids use, forcing them to use a wide range of apps just to establish a common-sense bedtime schedule. Smart Home Master is much more convenient. Through it, you can create an SSID just for the kids, using the ASUS Router App to set content restrictions and a screen time schedule. Any device that you connect to this network will follow those rules, making it easy to set up parental controls for new devices while also giving the power to adjust the settings for all their devices all at once. It’s a game-changer.
Smart Home Master also gives you peace of mind when it comes to security. Too many of today’s smart home devices never receive security updates, making them increasingly vulnerable to cybersecurity threats as time passes. But if you use Smart Home Master to create a separate IoT network, you can keep all your smart home devices on their own network. Even if one gets compromised, it’ll never have access to the private data on devices that you keep connected to other subnetworks.
Finally, this feature makes it more convenient to keep your network secure. Too many of us never change the password of our home networks because it’s too much of a hassle to follow through by entering that password for every single one of our devices. But when you have separate SSIDs for your primary devices, your kids’ devices, and your smart home devices, it’ll take much less effort to regularly update the network password for your main SSID.
Network security that doesn’t quit
In a connected world, your home network is the gateway to your digital life. The ASUS RT-BE82U provides complete visibility and control, defending against emerging threats and ensuring seamless protection for all your connected devices and personal data through ASUS Network Security.
- AiProtection powered by Trend Micro™: Protect your data and devices with commercial-grade cloud protection that safeguard your smart home network 24/7.
- Triple-level protection: Enjoy comprehensive security that extends all the way from the router to your devices to your internet connection, providing peace of mind.
- IoT Network: Create a single secure SSID for all your IoT devices, offering commercial-grade protection for enhanced security.
- VPN Network: Connect to your preferred VPN service with a single click through a dedicated subnetwork.
- Intuitive user interface and app: Monitor, control, and manage your network security, including advanced features such as VPNs, through either the ASUSWRT web GUI or the ASUS Router app on your mobile device.
- One-tap Security Scan: Diagnose the health and security of your network with one click, along with easy recommendations for improving your experience.
- Auto security updates: Stay protected with continuous updates and scans to protect against malware and emerging threats.
- Instant notifications: Receive optional real-time alerts for new device connections, enabling you to block unknown devices from accessing your network.
Comprehensive controls designed for today’s families
Your router is the perfect place for advanced parental controls, as it allows you to establish rules and settings for every device that your kids use all at once. Yet too many of our competitors hide these features behind expensive, never-ending subscriptions.
The RT-BE82U, on the other hand, helps you cultivate a balanced and protected digital life for your children, all without a subscription. Through the ASUS Router app — the same app that you’re likely to use for initial router setup — you’ll have all the tools you need for parental controls. Preset age-level profiles let you quickly filter age-inappropriate content and set screen time schedules. Flexible time scheduling lets you go a step further and define online and offline hours for each child, with the option to reward extra online time as positive reinforcement.
With these safe browsing rules in place, you won’t need to spend excess time watching over your kids’ shoulders at their online habits. When you do need to monitor their activity, the RT-BE82U makes it easy through an internet activity dashboard. This lets you check in on your kids’ internet usage through a comprehensive graphical dashboard, showing their online time, data consumption, and device-specific activity at a glance.
Advanced VPN capabilities that keep you protected anywhere, anytime
VPNs have emerged as an important tool for people to stay secure and connected. For your convenience, the ASUS RT-BE82U supports versatile VPN protocols, including the cutting-edge WireGuard® for lightning-fast speeds and optimal performance.
Even when you’re away from home, the RT-BE82U can help with your internet security. Through ASUS Instant Guard in the ASUS Router app, you’ll finally be able to take advantage of public WiFi networks in hotels, coffee shops, and airport lobbies without compromising security. It establishes a secure VPN for your mobile device that’s protected by the same level of security as your home network. Need to pass along that protection to your other devices, or to family and friends traveling with you? Instant Guard can give you a shareable URL that will allow other devices to use the same connection.
Advanced VPN features make sure that you’re able to do more with VPNs. Multiple VPN Connection support allows you to connect to multiple encrypted VPN tunnels simultaneously while maintaining performance for other devices on your network. VPN Network functionality lets you establish a dedicated subnetwork just for connecting to your preferred VPN service so that connecting to a VPN is as simple as changing the SSID that you’re connected to.
Designed, built, and packaged for sustainability
We know that sustainability is an important concern for many of our customers, and we’re committed to making sure that you have the options you need for accessing the latest technology without compromising your efforts toward sustainability. The construction materials of the ASUS RT-BE82U include 30% post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastics, a blend that offers higher quality, functionality, and durability than many competing designs. We put a focus on sustainability with the box, too, minimizing the use of plastics and using FSC® Mix-certified materials for the packaging.
Our sustainability efforts don’t stop the moment that you pull the ASUS RT-BE82U out of the box. We put in additional effort to ensure that this router provides exceptional reliability for long-lasting use. ASUS LAB certification helps to ensure award-winning endurance and efficient performance through rigorous testing. We also put a premium on re-use, allowing you to continue to get value out of your RT-BE82U through ASUS AiMesh technology even when you upgrade to a new router down the road.
The ASUS RT-BE82U offers incredible value for today’s smart homes
Too many home networks are powered by last-gen routers that deliver little but worry and inconvenience. The good news is that right now is a great time to upgrade your router. A next-gen ASUS router gives you access to all the latest WiFi 7 features while simultaneously simplifying your digital life with effortless management tools, easy options for scaling up your network, and comprehensive security features.
The ASUS WiFi 7 router lineup ranges all the way from entry-level models to cutting-edge powerhouses, allowing you to select a router with everything that you need and nothing that you don’t. The ASUS RT-BE82U stands out with an extremely well-balanced feature package that lets you upgrade to WiFi 7 at a very attainable price. Considering that it’s only $199.99 (USD) at the ASUS store, the RT-BE82U offers unbeatable value for homes everywhere. Upgrade your router today to experience worry-free home networking for yourself.
| ASUS RT-BE82U | |
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| US | ASUS |
| CA | ASUS |