Eero iPhone Connectivity Issues
Hello,
I have not yet purchased an Eero system yet; I am in the research stages deciding between Google Wifi, Orbi, Luma, Unify mesh, Amplifi, and Velop.
I have seen many reviews and threads in forums in regards to Apple IOS devices failing to 'roam' between APs, or randomly dropping connections, or staying connected to the furthest AP rather than switching to the closest one.
A couple years back I set up a $1000 Cisco Meraki AP for my home network. After countless issue with our iPhones and iPads not being able to connect, not seeing the SSIDs, and randomly dropping connections I switched back to my $100 Asus router, which has superior performance (for Apple devices) to the enterprise grade AP. I am looking for a modern WiFi solution to power all of our devices, including many Apple devices.
In any case, it seams Apple devices always have issues with WiFi, I am looking for a solid solution to this, I thought Eero was the winner until I started reading it also has the same issues with Apple. I have read that people have open cases with Eero regarding this, but it's still a known issue.
At my office we have a ton of Enterprise Cisco APs, in which iPhones can seamlessly roam between without loosing a video call. Obviously at the price point of Eero we cannot expect enterprise grade features, but I am looking for some input if others are having this issue with their iPhones on Eero, and what support / development teams are doing to solve this issue?
One other item of interest is outdoor WiFi coverage. With other mesh WiFi options on the market; outdoor weather resistant APs are offered. Does Eero have any intentions or future plans to offer the addition of outdoor APs to the mesh network?
Thanks in advance.
252 replies
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My 30 day return period is quickly approaching and I am experiencing similar issues with iOS devices. Can someone from Eero comment on the status of this please?
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Hi everyone -
Thanks again to everyone who has reached out to support. We greatly appreciate your patience and cooperation.
This is something we are continuing to look into. Unfortunately, it isn't an issue that affects all networks or devices (for example, it doesn't happen on all iPhone 7's on the same network), which makes it difficult to reproduce. If you haven't updated your network to eero OS 3.3 yet, please do so at your convenience and see if it helps in resolving this matter.
To update your network, take the following steps:
- Open the eero app
- Tap on the menu button
- Tap on Network Settings
- Scroll to Network software and tap on "Update available"
Again, we greatly appreciate everyone taking the time to reach out.
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I wonder if this has anything to do with WiFi calling on the iPhones? I may try turning that off to see if anything improves. None of the other WiFi devices have any problems jumping from AP to AP. It’s ALL the iPhones on the network that have WiFi calling enabled.
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Given the latest reply from Jeff, it sounds like I'll be putting my eero's back in their box and hoping some sort of progress is made before my 30 window is up (yes, I've been on the latest firmware). I'm rooting for eero, as a company and as a product, but what was promised as the end all be all of wifi solutions ended up being the ultimate exercise in patience and frustration on a level I've never dealt with in a wifi system.
I do find it a little confusing that it seems hard to reproduce for the eero team when a) they know the cause (iOS update that patched the broadcom chip) and b) I was able to observe it on nearly a half a dozen iOS devices within minutes of setting it up out of the box. At this point it just sounds like we're getting "works for me! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯". I know the engineers are working hard, it just doesn't _sound_ like any progess is being made since finding the cause.
I'll certainly check back, and hope the product restores the reliability it once seemed to have, but until then it's back to a good old fashioned router for me.
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Even with the latest eero firmware (3.3.0-350) and iOS 11 beta 9, I was still having the issue of the WiFi stack "crashing" every once in a while, which required a manual toggle of the WiFi setting in control center to get it back on track.
Installed the latest iOS 11 beta 10 yesterday, and since then, I have not had any issues. Seems like progress is being made on both sides. Will keep an eye on it, but so far so good.
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The Reddit thread at https://www.reddit.com/r/eero/comments/6x49u1/eeroosv330350_out/dmnz6c3/ suggested disabling IGMP Snooping on any managed network switches. I found a few other (unrelated) threads that recommend this as well. I have one (TP-LINK TL-SG108E-V2) between my Gateway Eero and another wired Eero, so I have disabled IGMP Snooping on it and will see how it goes.
Does anyone else with these issues have a switch on their network with IGPM Snooping enabled? If so, disable IGMP Snooping and see if that helps.
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Same issue here, especially bad with ios 11, beta 10. I decided to return the eero and get the Orbi, then decided to search for "iOS connectivity Orbi" only to find that there are many Orbi owners facing the same problems. Just got this email back from eero customer service:
"'I've gotten quite a bit of information about your iOS devices and tossed it up to our tech specialists. At the moment we don't have an ETA on when we might have a fix available for you. As I'm not sure how long it will take I don't want you to keep the product until you can no longer return it. I greatly apologize that we don't have anything more concrete to tell you just yet. I just wanted to keep you as informed as I could so that you could at least make an informed decision."
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I spent some time finding threads that seem to complaining about the same thing with all mesh network manufacturers:
I am going to place my bets that this is an iOS issue pertaining to device roaming. I think this is a globally impacting issue to Eero customers, but only a "small group" of people are complaining due to:
- Everyone having different physical environments, impacting signal strength and interference levels. Whatever is going on may only occur in some environments and not others. iOS roaming behavior is driven pretty much exclusively by signal strength/weakness and frequency noise.
- Different iPhone and Eero hardware/software mixes that behave differently in those variable environments.
- Different tolerances for pain / suffering in silence. I bet there are tons of people out there that are just blaming Comcast/their ISP or Apple for these issues, and that feedback isn't coming back around to Eero support or this forum.
I'm further going to venture a guess that this issue isn't rooted in the Broadcom crashing issue as I originally pointed out above, but is an effect that is a result of wireless vendors interoperability with iOS's WiFi roaming mechanisms.
I believe this is the case because enterprise WLAN providers like Cisco, Aruba, Meraki, and Unifi simply do not have these problems today using the exact same iOS device, but all the "new guys" to Wi-Fi roaming are learning the ropes like these enterprise-class vendors had to. Looking at more recent WiFi roaming tech notes from Apple, it is clear there are multiple standards for Wi-Fi vendors to juggle, some of which appear to be co-developed with Cisco (Apple's exclusive enterprise networking partner). (PS, there is a feature with Airport Utility and WiFi signal strengths I didn't know you could access at the bottom of this tech doc)
So I think the bottom line is: this is the price you pay for being bleeding edge when vendors are trying to adopt enterprise-level features into consumer grade solutions 😫. I have no doubt they'll get it nailed (their existence depends on it!), but us early adopters suffer in the mean time. Our role is to keep raising tickets and providing help where possible to encourage the prioritization of these fixes over the sexy new features that the market generally demands.
That said, I'd love nothing more than to be proven wrong with an iOS 11 or eero release that fixes it all 🙌
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Just purchased 6 eeros. System worked great for a week but all of a sudden my iphone and my wife's stopped working. They connected but do not pass traffic. All of our iPads, Macs, MacBooks work fine. I tried everything listed above but still not working. Very frustrating after spending almost $1k on a wifi system for the entire house. Any other thoughts here?
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There’s a “sister thread” on Reddit, and unlike the response I got from eero, advising me to return my system, an eero developer there said an eero-side fix is coming soon. Fingers crossed.
https://www.reddit.com/r/eero/comments/6zgte9/with_ios_11_and_macos_high_sierra_release_around/
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I’ve been on the GM final release of iOS 11 for one hour and moved around my house and haven’t had to toggle off WiFi a single time on my IPhone 7 Plus. That’s unprecedented, as I need to toggle
every time I pick up the phone again if I put it down, so basically every few minutes. Fingers crossed this is fixed.
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Nope. I upgraded to iOS 11 GM and my Wifi locked up within 10 minutes. iPhone 7 Plus.
Hey Eero, if you're having trouble recreating this problem at your office, send a tech to my house. I live in the Seattle area. I'll even buy beer.
Content aside
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