NetGear review: Buyer beware: orbi mesh

I purchased a Netgear Orbi 870 mesh system that included the router plus two satellites. Within the first 30 days the system functioned okay. The Orbi 870 mesh is advertised to handle up to 150 devices, and my home network only has 55 devices online on average at any given time.

The ability to return the product ends after 30 days, which is when the system began exhibiting severe lag. Websites froze. Basic website thumbnail graphics (i.e. nothing high definition) would take 2-5 minutes to load. Streaming and online gaming wasn’t possible. Bandwidth isn’t the issue since I have Verizon Fios 1Gb service. The lagging issue was inconsistent. Sometimes Orbi Mesh 870 would function okay for a few hours, then rapidly exhibit so much lag that it couldn’t even run a check via SpeedTest.net. Power down and start up again only “resolved” the lag issue for maybe a couple of hours. A repeat power down and start up again only gained about another hour of useful Internet connection until severe lag struck again. I was shutting down and starting up Orbi 870 mesh at least 4 times a day, which is unacceptable.

The only thing that had changed on my home network was changing out the Orbi 750 mesh, a WiFi 6 system, for the newer Orbi 870 mesh, a WiFi 7 system. Since the Orbi 870 mesh was consistently dysfunctional, I reverted my home network back to the Orbi 750 mesh. Everything worked just fine with the older system.

Netgear support refused to believe me about the Orbi 870 mesh severe lag issues. I offered to pay the difference to upgrade to Orbi 970, but they flat denied me because “it was against their policy.” Netgear considered offering a RMA, delayed for about 2 months, then closed the trouble ticket with no resolution. Two different people at Netgear support claimed over and over again to have tried to call me, but Verizon has absolutely no record of incoming calls to my phone on the days Netgear support claims to have called me — that’s either incompetence dialing a phone number, or flat out lying, and either case is really bad. I have a one year product warranty, still good until April 2026, but Netgear has failed to exchange the Orbi 870 mesh.