Guest WiFi: A Detailed Guide

Nowadays, giving a guest your home’s WiFi password is just as commonplace as bringing them a drink. It’s kind and occasionally even expected.

The outside world is something you want your friends and family to stay connected to, but every time you let a new device access your network, you put yourself at risk for several dangers. To keep your home network safe, set up a guest WiFi network.

Guest WiFi Network – What is it?

A guest network establishes a separate, independent access point to the internet while most gadgets in your home are linked to the same local area network (LAN).

To put it another way, if a new phone or laptop joins your WiFi through a guest network, it won’t be connected to any computers, speakers, or other devices on your main network.

If you’ve ever logged on to WiFi in a restaurant, coffee shop, or hotel, there’s a good chance you’ve already joined a guest network. While you were allowed to browse the internet and listen to music, you could not use any of their other equipment, such as sending a document to the printer in the “staff only” area. You may not have been aware of this at the time.

Why would a home have a guest network?

Private users can also profit from guest WiFi access at home, even if guest networks are popular among enterprises.

It prevents unauthorized users from using your private network. There are several techniques to protect your Wi-Fi, including setting up private home networks for your household’s gadgets. Someone who gained access to your main network could:

Download unlawful material. Some nations impose severe penalties for content obtained illegally. Your guest network’s settings will likely provide your visitors with an alternate IP address, which might aid in distinguishing people in the case of illegal conduct;
Data snooping on your network. Data exchanged across your internal network may be accessed by a third party. Additionally, they might use gadgets linked to it;
Follow other users. Your Wi-Fi might be used to monitor the actions of other users by a skilled hacker;
Malware to infect you. Some routers can separate visitors from one another. The virus may spread to other connected devices if someone enters your network using a malicious or infected device. Users won’t be able to see one another on the network, making it impossible for someone with bad intentions to hurt others;

Your personal and guest networks might have different sets of rules. You may restrict your visitors’ bandwidth to prevent network overload or unauthorized file downloads. You don’t have to completely turn off the Wi-Fi connection if you want to disconnect a guest WiFi if something is wrong;
Because you can use a shorter, more remembered password for visitors while keeping your longer, more secure private network password a secret, guest networks are more practical. You may still create a secure and simple-to-remember password for your guest network.

Advantages of Guest Wifi

Easy Login

Users don’t need to bother about a password because they can easily identify the network name on an unsecured guest network. Frequently, the principal network’s name with the word “Guest” added to it is the name of the guest option. Customers are more satisfied due to the procedure being made simple for visits, whether they are family.

Network Protection

Security is another benefit of a guest network. Using a separate network, users’ devices are kept separate from your company’s equipment and data, such as shared files and printers. Furthermore, you may control the two networks independently, setting one as necessary without impacting the other.

For instance, you may limit the bandwidth guests can use if you want to provide them with basic Internet access without the ability to download anything. Additionally, you may limit the number of guests who can join at once and specify specific hours for visitors to access to the guest network.

Because visitors may unintentionally download malware that may infect the network, which boosts the business’s security. By keeping it distinct, your main network is kept secure. And as the Internet of Things (IoT) develops, more and more susceptible gadgets will require ongoing connectivity.

Making A Single WiFi Network With Several Access Points

You should make sure your router has this capacity since many routers let you set up guest access via numerous Wi-Fi networks with various parameters on each of them. If not, you must connect to a different access point or router.

Disadvantages of Guest Wifi

Network stuttering

Despite these benefits, a guest network may slow down your main network, especially if several guests attempt connections simultaneously. Customers in all sectors do demand access to the Internet. According to Pew Research, 81 percent of Americans now have smartphones, up almost 50 percent since 2011, and around half of the people have a tablet computer and an e-reader.

Users connecting attempts are multiplying. Additionally, allowing every visitor with a smart device to access their email, social media, and favorite television shows would ultimately put an additional load on the network as a whole. Additionally, one guest’s use of Wi-Fi in this manner might limit the amount of network connectivity that other visitors can have.

Although it may not result in as much customer happiness as you’d want, this problem may be partially resolved by restricting the amount of network bandwidth visitors can use and banning streaming.

Network Password for Guests

Whether or not to password-protect the guest network is a different question. Users don’t need to look for the access code and may join immediately, which is one advantage of an unsecured network, as was already discussed. However, remember that any nearby non-guest user can connect to the network without a password.

To increase security, If you use a password on the guest network, at the very least, make sure it is placed somewhere where guests can see it.

Discover Who’s Connected to Your Wi-Fi Network
Keeping track of the devices connected to your Wi-Fi network is crucial for maintaining the security and performance of your network. It’s important to know who and what is connected to ensure that unauthorized access is prevented and to avoid any potential slowdowns. In this guide, we’ll walk you through the steps to uncover the devices connected to your Wi-Fi and how to keep your network secure.

How to Configure Guest Wifi

Even though various routers may have different tools or techniques, creating a guest network is typically not too difficult. Even some routers have them turned on by default. Make sure your router is capable of using this function. If not, we urge you to get one that does.

You may visit your router’s settings and enable a guest network by entering your router’s IP address in the browser area. Once logged in, find the part that allows the guest’s Wi-Fi to activate it.

Depending on the manufacturer of your router, it could go by several names. Check the user manual for your device if you can’t locate it.

The router’s control interface lets you also change the settings for your guest network. These are our suggestions:

Utilize the WPA2 network authentication technique to encrypt and protect traffic from prospective snoopers. Ensure that your router can handle it;
By changing the settings on your network, you can ensure that only the right users can access the data. A few routers feature extra checkboxes in their panels that let visitors access the router’s or principal network’s settings.
Create a secure password for your router so that only you have access to it and can make changes to its settings;
Always verify the functionality of the guest network yourself;
Set the appropriate load balance to prevent your primary network from becoming overwhelmed, especially when several users join at once;
Don’t allow unauthorized users to use your Wi-Fi.

How To Create A Guest Wifi Network

Setting up a guest network may be difficult for folks without computer experience since you need to know your router’s IP address and admin login information. Using the Minim® Mobile app, setting up and managing a guest network is as easy as sending an email.

Choose the Network tab,
Tap the +Add network button in the top right-hand corner of the square after scrolling down to the WiFi networks section.
Enter your SSID name and password under the Credentials header.
Turn on the Isolate devices switch under Security to prevent networked devices from communicating with those on different networks, i.e., It should be a guest network.
You may designate the network as either home or work under the Network Type header (note: the Home and Work labels are fundamentally the same functionality, so either can be applied to your guest network).
To complete adding the SSID, press the Add network button one last time. It will reroute you to a page with an overview of your new network.

Evil Twin Attack: A Detailed Guide
It is crucial to understand what an Evil Twin attack is and how to defend yourself from it. You will learn in this article how to defend against evil twin attacks.

Conclusion

A crucial but not final step in home security is setting up a guest Wi-Fi network. You may handle network device management, capacity limitations, and other security features and controls under advanced settings.

Unknown and potentially unsecured devices can connect to a guest Wi-Fi network without interfering with your private home network. A guest network may be set up in a short amount of time. To reduce danger, you may create guest networks to house a home management system, cameras, gaming consoles, and any other devices you’d prefer to keep on a different network.