Many people rely on Wi-Fi for their everyday work and leisure needs. But the significant increase in Wi-Fi usage in recent years has created a traffic and congestion issue so bad that Wi-Fi service often slows to a crawl, making it unreliable.
Portal is a router that taps into unused spectrum to create faster, more resilient Wi-Fi that’s much faster than typical Wi-Fi service today. It also provides greater coverage throughout a user’s home. Portal’s proprietary spectrum turbocharger technology provides access to 300 percent more of the radio airwaves than other routers, improving performance by as much as 300 times, and range and coverage by as much as two times in crowded settings including city homes and multi-unit apartments.
The device’s FCC-certified technology FastLanes enables the user’s Wi-Fi network to operate in a special protected portion of the 5GHz radio spectrum that was originally reserved for weather radar systems. Its SmartLanes technology, meanwhile, actively monitors for congestion and intelligently changes Wi-Fi lanes to steer around network congestion.
Portal ships in October. Future pricing isn’t given. But early bird Kickstarter backers can get one starting in July with a pledge starting at $139. Its makers are out to raise $160,000 by July 8.
There is a huge potential audience for a router that promises the high level of performance that Portal does. Other device makers have created routers, including Spider, that promised better service than existing ones. Among the few potential negatives of Portal is that the companion mobile app that can be used to set up and manage Portal only works with iOS 8 or higher and Android 5 or higher devices. But Portal can also be managed by any Web browser, its makers say.