“Bro, you absolutely have to check out my new router” is a sentence that’s probably never been uttered, but that could now change thanks to Google’s new Nest Wifi Pro.
Resembling a gloriously juicy, fruity sweet, the curvaceous router is available in a range of tantalisingly glossy colours, looking good enough to proudly display on a table or shelf, rather than hide away beneath dusty cable-riddled sideboards.
Looks aside, standout features include Wi-Fi 6E compatibility for blazing-fast speeds — assuming you’ve got other Wi-Fi 6E-capable devices to take advantage of it, that is. Considering that the previous generation Nest Wifi was released in 2019, this is a noticeable boost in performance.
As before, you can buy multiple routers if you want to create a mesh network to cover larger areas without a drop in signal strength and speed, with each identical router being able to act as a mesh unit without any hardware differences between them.
Each router features two gigabit Ethernet ports, and can also act as a Thread border router (with future support to act as a Matter hub), which, in short, means you can create an all-encompassing low-power network to connect all of your compatible smart devices.
Sadly (though perhaps understandably), there’s no built-in speaker and Google Assistant support in this latest iteration. Depending on where you keep your router, this could be devasting or a point of complete indifference, but at least setting things up and configuring options like a guest network will be simple via Google’s Home app.
Available to preorder now in Snow, Linen, Fog, and Lemongrass (rather delightful names, if we say so ourselves), the Google Nest Wifi Pro will land on shelves on 27 October, starting from £189.99 for a single router. Sadly there’s no two-pack bundle, but you can nab a set of three for £379.99, if you fancy.
Those of you hoping for backwards compatibility with previous generation Nest routers should note that there isn’t any, so you’ll have to get a new set from scratch if you want to upgrade.
