How Many Access Points Does Your Office Really Need? A WiFi Planning Guide

Ask around, and you’ll get a different answer every time for the query related to wifi access points. One per floor. One per 1,000 square feet. Just buy a stronger one. 

Most of these rules of thumb are wrong for at least half the offices that use them. Yes, that’s right.

The real number depends on your building, your team, and how they use the internet. You can work out a decent estimate yourself in about ten minutes. Here’s how!

Why a Single Router Stops Working

Most offices start with whatever router the broadband company sent. For five people and a few emails, it does the job.

Then you hire more staff. Video calls become a daily habit. Suddenly the WiFi drops in the meeting room and slows to a crawl at 3 pm. That’s because one router can only handle so many devices at once, and its signal fades with every wall it has to pass through.

Adding more WiFi access points shares the workload. Each one looks after its own patch of the office, so none of them gets overloaded.

How to Work Out How Many You Need

Step 1: Count Devices, Not People

Headcount is a poor guide. Devices matter more.

A single employee might have a laptop, a phone, and a tablet all online. Then there are printers, smart TVs, conference screens, and visitors’ phones. A team of 25 can easily have 100 devices connected.

A fair rule for a normal office is 25 to 30 active devices per access point. If your team spends all day on video calls or shifting large files, drop that to 15 or 20. So 100 devices at 25 each gives you four access points. That’s your starting figure, and you’ll adjust it in the next steps.

Step 2: Look at the Building

Numbers only tell half the story. Walls tell the rest.

In a big open-plan space, one access point might cover 1,500 to 2,000 square feet. Put in a few meeting rooms and that drops quickly. Plasterboard barely gets in the way. Brick, concrete, and glass do. Lift shafts, stairwells, and metal shelving are worse still.

If your office has more than one floor, each floor needs its own units, since signal doesn’t pass through concrete slabs well. And an office chopped into lots of small rooms might need an access point every two or three rooms, even if the total floor space is small.

Step 3: Think About How Your Team Works

Two offices the same size can need very different setups.

A design studio uploading huge files needs fast WiFi in every corner. An accounts team working in browser-based software can manage with less. A sales floor on phone calls needs a steady connection above all, because a delay of even a second makes conversations awkward.

Some spots are busier than others. Reception, the canteen, and the main meeting room all pack lots of people into small spaces. Give those areas their own access point, even if another one sits nearby.

Where to Put Your Access Points

Where you fit them matters almost as much as how many you buy. A well-placed unit beats an extra one shoved in a cupboard.

Mount them on the ceiling, near the middle of the area they cover. The signal spreads downward and outward, a bit like light from a lamp. Keep them out of cabinets and away from metal ceiling tiles. Microwaves are a problem too, as they create radio interference.

Resist the urge to place them close together. When the signals overlap too much, they get in each other’s way, and the WiFi can end up worse than before.

Aim for a signal strength of about -65 dBm or better wherever people sit. Free survey apps for phones and laptops will show you the readings as you walk around.

Choosing the Best Wireless Access Point for Your Office

There’s no single best wireless access point that suits every business. The right one depends on your office size, your budget, and how much of the setup you want to manage yourself.

Still, a few features are worth looking for:

• WiFi 6 or 6E. These cope much better with crowded offices than older models. WiFi 7 is worth a look if you plan to keep the gear for years.
• Power over Ethernet (PoE). One cable carries both data and power, so you don’t need a plug socket on the ceiling.
• Central management. You control every unit from one screen rather than logging into each separately.
• Guest network support. Visitors get internet access without touching your work systems.

Where TP-Link Fits In

For small and mid-sized offices, a TP-Link wireless access point is a popular pick. The range is wide, prices are reasonable, and the Omada system lets you run all your units from one dashboard. You can set up a guest network, see who’s using what, and push out updates without visiting each device.

The ceiling-mount PoE models are simple to install and suit most ordinary offices. A large or awkward building might need higher-end gear, or a different brand altogether. Whatever you pick, stay with one product family. Mixing brands makes management harder and can make devices switch between units less smoothly.

A Worked Example

Take a 3,000 square foot office on one floor. There’s an open work area, four meeting rooms, and 30 staff using around 100 devices.

By capacity, that’s four access points. By coverage, the open area needs two and the meeting rooms need two. Both methods land on four, so that’s where you start. If the meeting rooms are used for video calls all day, add a fifth.

Test Before You Fix Anything in Place

Don’t drill into the ceiling on day one. Set the units up temporarily and walk the whole office with a laptop or phone running a survey app. Find the weak spots and move things around until they’re gone.

It costs a little time and saves you from expensive mistakes. Once everything’s installed, test again at the busiest time of day. That’s when problems show up.

Getting It Right

Too few access points leave dead zones and slow connections. Too many cause interference and waste money. The right number comes from counting devices, checking the building, and placing each unit carefully.

If you’d rather not guess, MY IT HUB can run a proper site survey, recommend the right number of WiFi access points for your space, and help you choose and install the equipment. Get in touch today to book a free WiFi planning consultation.