How to Move Your Router to Another Room (With or Without Wiring)

Your ISP installer put the router wherever the closest coax outlet happened to be — often a corner of the living room, a basement utility room, or a hallway closet. If that location leaves half your home with a weak signal, moving the router to a more central spot can dramatically improve coverage without spending a dollar on new hardware.

This guide covers four methods to relocate your router, ranked from simplest to most involved. Choose the one that fits your home and budget.

Why Moving Your Router Matters

Router placement is the single biggest factor in WiFi performance that most people never address. A router in a corner broadcasts its signal mostly toward exterior walls and the outside world. A router in the center of your home distributes signal in every direction where your devices actually live.

Before trying any of the methods below, check our room-by-room router placement guide to identify the best target location — ideally a central, elevated spot away from thick concrete walls, metal appliances, and microwaves.

Method 1: Run a Longer Ethernet Cable From Your Modem

This is the simplest solution if your modem (or gateway) is separate from your router. Your modem stays connected to the coax or phone line where it is, and you run a standard Ethernet cable from the modem to your router in the new location.

What You Need

• Cat5e or Cat6 Ethernet cable (Cat6 is preferred for future-proofing)
• A cable long enough to reach — Ethernet runs up to 328 feet (100 meters) without signal degradation
• Optional: cable clips, raceways, or wall plates for a clean installation

Steps

1. Measure the cable path from your modem to the target room. Add 10–15% extra for routing around corners and doorframes.
2. Unplug your router from the modem.
3. Run the new Ethernet cable along baseboards, through doorframes, or through the wall if you’re comfortable doing so. Cable raceways (plastic channels that mount to the wall) give a professional look without drilling.
4. Plug one end into the WAN/Internet port on your router and the other into an available LAN port on your modem.
5. Power the router back on in the new location.

Cost: $10–$25 for a pre-made Ethernet cable. This is the most reliable method and introduces no speed penalty.

Method 2: Use a MoCA Adapter to Move Over Existing Coax

If your home has coaxial cable outlets in multiple rooms (which most homes built before 2010 do), MoCA (Multimedia over Coax Alliance) adapters let you send a wired network signal through that existing coax wiring — no new cables required.

How MoCA Works

A pair of MoCA 2.5 adapters can deliver up to 2.5 Gbps of bonded throughput over coax with typical real-world speeds of 900–1,000 Mbps and latency under 5 ms. This is significantly faster and more reliable than any WiFi extender.

What You Need

• Two MoCA adapters (brands: Actiontec, goCoax, Hitron)
• An existing coax outlet in both rooms
• Short Ethernet patch cables to connect each adapter to your modem/router

Steps

1. Connect the first MoCA adapter to the coax outlet in the room where your modem is, then run an Ethernet cable from the adapter to the modem’s LAN port.
2. In the room where you want the router, connect the second MoCA adapter to the coax outlet there.
3. Run a short Ethernet cable from the second MoCA adapter into the WAN port of your router.
4. Power everything on. The two adapters automatically pair and create a wired Ethernet bridge over the coax line.

Cost: $70–$120 for a pair of MoCA 2.5 adapters. See our guide on MoCA adapters explained for more detail. Some newer all-in-one gateways from Comcast (Xfinity) and Cox have MoCA built in, which means you only need one external adapter.

Method 3: Use Powerline Adapters

Powerline adapters use your home’s existing electrical wiring to carry network traffic between rooms. Like MoCA, they come in pairs: one adapter plugs into a wall outlet near your modem, and the second plugs in near where you want the router.

What to Expect

Modern powerline adapters (AV2 standard, 1000–2000 Mbps rated) typically deliver real-world speeds of 200–500 Mbps depending on the quality of your home’s electrical wiring and how far apart the outlets are. Performance varies more than MoCA because electrical wiring was never designed for data.

For best results, plug powerline adapters directly into the wall outlet — never into a surge protector or power strip, which filters out the network signal.

Cost

$40–$80 for a quality pair (TP-Link AV1000 or similar). This is the cheapest option if you don’t have coax in the target room. See our comparison of powerline adapters vs mesh WiFi to decide which fits your situation better.

Method 4: Leave the Router and Add a Wireless Access Point

If moving the router isn’t practical, the fourth option is to leave your router in place and add a dedicated wireless access point (WAP) in the room with poor coverage. The access point connects back to your router via Ethernet (or via one of the methods above) and creates a full-strength WiFi network in the new room.

Access Point vs. WiFi Extender

A wired access point is not the same as a wireless extender/repeater. Extenders work over WiFi and cut your bandwidth roughly in half because they must receive and re-transmit on the same radio. A wired access point connects via Ethernet, so it delivers full speeds with zero overhead — it’s essentially a second router antenna for your network.

Popular access points for home use include the TP-Link EAP series (Omada), Ubiquiti UniFi, and ASUS access points. Many mid-range routers can also be configured in access point mode.

Which Method Should You Choose?

Method	Speed	Cost	Difficulty
Longer Ethernet cable	Full speed (up to 1–10 Gbps)	$10–$25	Easy
MoCA adapters	900–1,000 Mbps real-world	$70–$120	Easy
Powerline adapters	200–500 Mbps real-world	$40–$80	Easy
Wired access point	Full speed at new location	$50–$150	Moderate

Quick Tips for the New Location

• Go central and elevated. A shelf or tabletop in the middle of your home beats a floor corner every time.
• Avoid the kitchen. Microwaves and metal appliances cause serious interference on the 2.4 GHz band.
• Keep it vertical. Most router antennas radiate signal horizontally, so a vertical orientation spreads coverage across a floor plan rather than up and down.
• Give it breathing room. Don’t place the router inside a cabinet or entertainment center — heat buildup slows performance and shortens router life.
• After moving, run a speed test from several rooms using our WiFi speed test to confirm the new placement actually improved coverage.

What About Combo Modem/Router Gateways?

If your ISP gave you an all-in-one gateway (modem and router combined), your options are slightly different. You can’t simply separate the modem and router because they’re one device. In this case, your best options are:

1. Ask your ISP to enable “IP passthrough” or “bridge mode” on the gateway, then connect your own router to the gateway via Ethernet and place it wherever you want.
2. Use MoCA or powerline adapters to create a wired backhaul to a separate router or access point in a better location, while the gateway stays where it is.
3. Upgrade to a mesh WiFi system, where one node connects to the gateway and additional nodes cover the rest of the home wirelessly or via a wired backhaul.

If you go the mesh route, see our guide to mesh WiFi vs extenders to understand the difference and pick the right system.