ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 is the latest wireless router launched by ASUS worldwide. It is a beautiful router, with modern hardware, support for all the latest wireless technologies, and top-notch performance. If you would like to see what you get from this premium router, read this detailed review and comparison with other routers in its niche:
What is the ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 router good at?
ASUS RT-AC86U is a perfect choice if:
- You want great online gaming experience with the minimum latency possible
- You desire a fast wireless network, on the 5GHz band, with support for the latest networking standards and features
- You prefer advanced firmware that is very customizable and offers complete control
- You want an advanced mobile app from which you can personalize almost everything your router has to offer
- You desire the best security you can get for your smart home
Pros and cons
There are several great things about the ASUS RT-AC86U:
- Top-notch performance on the 5GHz wireless frequency
- Useful features for online gaming that minimize your latency
- Excellent security features that will secure your smart home on many levels
- Modern hardware that can handle many clients and simultaneous connections
- You get an advanced smartphone app for administering your wireless router
- Great multi-lingual support and easily accessible Help documentation
Cons:
- You cannot mount it on walls, and it can be used only in one position
- You cannot use the smartphone app from anywhere on the internet
Verdict
ASUS is famous for its over-the-top wireless routers, with tons of features, eccentric looks, powerful hardware, and high prices. One such example is the recent ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300, which is one of the most sophisticated wireless routers ever created. ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 tones it down a notch. Its looks are less eccentric, and its hardware and features are a bit more down to earth. So is the price. This router will most probably replace the very popular ASUS RT-AC87U and it is a significant upgrade over its predecessor in many ways. If your budget is not limitless, and you want a high-end router, with good performance, excellent security, and useful gaming-friendly features, ASUS RT-AC86U is a well-balanced choice that you should consider. We recommend it to all our readers.
Unboxing the ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 wireless router
The ASUS RT-AC86U wireless router comes in a big black box, made of cardboard, with a big picture of the device on its top. On the back, you can see some information about the unique features of this device, like its dual-core processor and commercial-grade home network security features.
When you open the box, you get to see the router and a big leaflet about the WTFast gamers private network service that is available with this router. This wireless router is aimed both at enthusiasts who require great wireless coverage and top-notch security, and at gamers who want the lowest latency possible when playing online.
When you unbox everything, you find the following items: the wireless router, three detachable antennas, the power adapter, an Ethernet cable, the warranty, the quick start guide, technical support information, and the leaflet about WTFast mentioned earlier.
The unboxing experience offered by the ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 wireless router is a pleasant one. The packaging includes all the accessories you need for setting it up.
Hardware specifications and design
ASUS RT-AC86U is a modern, dual-band router, with a total maximum bandwidth of 2900 Mbps, split as follows: 750 Mbps for the 2.4 GHz frequency and 2167 Mbps for the 5 GHz frequency. Since this is a very new router, it offers support for all the major wireless networking standards, including 802.11ac Wave 2 and 802.11n. It has three external antennas and one internal antenna.
ASUS RT-AC86U has a powerful dual-core Broadcom BCM4906 processor running at 1.8 GHz, 256 MB for storing the firmware and 512MB of RAM. This is powerful hardware for a wireless router.
It is a medium-sized router, with 8.7 inches or 22.09 cm in width, 6.3 inches or 16.02 cm in height, and 3.3 inches or 8.38 cm in depth, without the bezel. It also weighs a total of 1.9 lb or 861 grams.
On the back of the router, you can find the Power button, the DC socket, one USB 2.0 port, one USB 3.1 port, the WAN port, a button for controlling the LEDs on the front of the router, and four Ethernet ports at 1 Gbps.
On the right side of the router, you will find a button for WPS and one for turning the WiFi on and off. On the front of this router, there are many LEDs: one for showing whether the router is powered on, one for the 2.4 GHz band, another for the 5 GHz band, one indicating the status of your internet connection, and one for each of the four Ethernet ports, showing whether devices are connected to them or not.
If you would like to learn more about the official specifications of this wireless router, you should go to this page: ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 Specifications.
Setting up and using the ASUS RT-AC86U wireless router
ASUS RT-AC86U can be set up just like any other router. When you load the quick setup wizard in a web browser, you are first asked to change the default username and password, which you should. Then, the wizard detects the type of your internet connection and asks for the necessary details. Once that is done, you can set the name and password for the two wireless bands that are broadcast by the router.
When the initial setup is over, you are shown a summary of your settings, and you can then load the administration user interface. As you can see below, the interface of ASUS RT-AC86U wireless router looks the same as on all modern ASUS routers. It is very well organized, and finding your way should be easy both for knowledgeable users and for beginners. If you have a network with many devices, you will appreciate the Status tab, on the Network Map, which shows the resource consumption for the processor and the RAM, as well as the speed of each Ethernet port.
As always with ASUS routers, the help documentation is easily available. One way is to move the mouse over a setting and, when it turns into a question mark, click on it. This displays a tooltip with more information about that setting. You also get links to FAQ documentation in several sections with settings.
The user interface is available in nineteen languages, which you can see below.
When we finished configuring everything on the ASUS RT-AC86U router, we connected all the devices from our network: desktop computers, laptops, tablets, smartphones, smart plugs, smart bulbs, consoles, and a wireless printer. We had no issues when connecting any of them. Also, the wireless network broadcast by ASUS RT-AC86U was fast and stable in our whole test apartment. The only downside that we identified is the fact that you cannot mount this router on walls. Also, it can be placed only in one position.
Overall, we are pleased with this router's operation, its speed, ease of use and configuration. We had no stability issues, and the wireless network was fast everywhere in our test apartment.
If you would like to learn more about the real-life performance of this router and our benchmarks, read the next page of this review.
Wireless network performance
Before sharing the data from our measurements, let's take a look at the apartment that was used in our testing and how it is set up. You can see that the router is placed in the living room. With most wireless routers, the signal strength is not that high in places like the Kitchen and the Medium balcony.
Our testing was done using a fast 1 Gigabit Internet connection that's capable of uploads on the internet of up to 500 Mbps. We used a Microsoft Surface Pro 3 for all our measurements and several software tools.
To get a better perspective of the performance offered by ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900, we compared it with ASUS RT-AC87U (a previous generation model from ASUS which proved very popular) and with TP-Link Archer C3200 (one of its top competitors).
At first, we evaluated the performance of the 2.4 GHz wireless network. We started by measuring the signal strength offered in each room, using a tool named inSSIDer. As you can see below, the signal strength delivered is good and it tends to beat that provided by ASUS RT-AC87U in most rooms.
Next, we used SpeedTest to measure how fast the internet connection offered by this router is when using 2.4 GHz wireless network. The download speed varied a lot from room to room, and ASUS RT-AC86U was never the fastest.
When evaluating the upload speed, ASUS RT-AC86U was in second place, after TP-Link Archer C3200.
Continuing our measurements on the 2.4 GHz wireless network, we used the PassMark Performance test to transfer data between two computers connected to the network. ASUS RT-AC86U delivered good download speeds, but it was not the fastest router.
Things improved a bit when measuring the upload speed, and ASUS RT-AC86U was the fastest in some rooms.
The 2.4 GHz wireless network offered by ASUS RT-AC86U is stable and reasonably fast. However, other routers can deliver faster wireless connections on this band.
Next, we analyzed the performance offered by the 5GHz wireless network. First, we looked at the evolution of the signal strength, from room to room. As you can see below, ASUS RT-AC86U delivers an excellent signal in most rooms.
We moved to SpeedTest, to measure the speed of the internet connection on the 5GHz wireless network. To see the maximum potential of this router, we used the world's only PCI-E network card with support for 4x4 MU-MIMO: ASUS PCE-AC88. When we used this network card, we obtained a maximum speed of 716.25 Mbps for the download and 521.70 Mbps for the upload speed. These are the fastest speeds we have measured so far on a wireless router, and they are imposing.
To get back to earth, and everyday devices people use, we took our Surface Pro 3 and measured the download speed with SpeedTest, in every room of our test apartment. ASUS RT-AC86U outperformed its predecessor ASUS RT-AC87U when looking at the download speed.
When measuring the upload speed, ASUS RT-AC86U was excellent. However, when we tested ASUS RT-AC87U, our internet connection was capped at 100 Mbps for the upload speed, and when we tested TP-Link Archer C3200, our internet connection was capped at 200 Mbps for the upload speed.
For the last measurements on the 5GHz wireless network, we used the PassMark Performance test to transfer data between two computers connected to the network. ASUS RT-AC86U delivered excellent performance when measuring the download speed, managing to beat its competitors in most rooms.
The same was true when measuring the upload speed in all rooms.
ASUS RT-AC86U delivers high-speed wireless network connections on the 5GHz band. This area is a strength of this wireless router.
Wired network performance
To test the quality of the wired Ethernet connection, we used a desktop PC, equipped with an Intel Core i5 4460 processor, running at 3.20GHz, 16GB of RAM and a very fast Samsung 850 Pro 512GB SSD and a Lenovo Ideacentre 610s mini PC.
We started by measuring the download and upload speeds using SpeedTest. When we tested ASUS RT-AC87U, our internet connection was capped at 100 Mbps for the upload speed, and when we tested TP-Link Archer C3200, our internet connection was capped at 200 Mbps for the upload speed. Today, our internet connection is capped at 500 Mbps for the upload speed, and ASUS RT-AC86U reached this maximum speed. Downloads were very fast too, very close to the 1 Gbps that is promised by our internet service provider.
Then, we ran a network transfer between the two computers, using the PassMark Performance test. Here, we can see that ASUS RT-AC86U was faster than TP-Link Archer C3200 and a bit slower than ASUS RT-AC87U.
ASUS RT-AC86U delivers real 1 Gbps connections that you can count on when using its Ethernet ports.
USB performance
We connected a portable SSD drive to the ASUS RT-AC86U, through the USB 3.1 port and then we used LAN SpeedTest Lite to transfer data to and from it and measure the speed. As you can see below, the USB port on the ASUS RT-AC86U is high-speed, delivering a download speed of 229 Mbps.
The USB 3.1 port on the ASUS RT-AC86U wireless router is very fast, and this will please many users.
Extra features
As is always the case with premium wireless routers made by ASUS, ASUS RT-AC86U bundles plenty of advanced features that are not found on competing routers. On this specific models, there are quite a few features for gamers:
- WTFast GPN - You get the option to create a WTFast account, for optimized online gaming through a unique VPN service. You get access to some free features but, for the full service, you need to pay extra to WTFast.
- LAN Boost - a one-click optimizer that enables Adaptive QoS to optimize inbound and outbound traffic for online gaming. If you want the best online gaming experience, you will want to enable this feature.
- Real-Time Network Protection - it is a shortcut to the AiProtection module.
Security is a significant feature in ASUS RT-AC86U, and it is all provided by the AiProtection module, which includes several tools and options:
- A comprehensive Router Security Assessment tool which verifies where your router's settings are secure. When it finds problems, it proactively informs you and takes you where you need to fix things.
- Malicious Sites Blocking - a very efficient cloud-based module that blocks malicious websites on all the devices that are connected to your network.
- Two-Way IPS - an improved two-way intrusion prevention system that protects all your network from spam, DDoS attacks, network attacks and more. Additionally, it also scans the packets that are sent from your network to the internet.
- Infected Device Prevention and Blocking - if your network devices get infected, and they become zombies in malware networks, they are automatically blocked by your router, and you are informed about this problem so that you can fix things.
The ASUS RT-AC86U wireless router also includes many other features that you can find on other ASUS routers too:
- Guest Network - you can enable up to three wireless networks for each band, with individual security and access settings.
- Adaptive QoS - an intelligent QoS (Quality of Service) tool that you can use to analyze and prioritize network traffic efficiently.
- Traffic Analyzer - offers visual traffic statistics which give you a clear picture of how your network is used and by which devices.
- USB Applications - apps that are designed to work with all kinds of devices that you can connect to the router using USB: external hard disks, printers, and 3G or 4G dongles or modems.
- AiCloud 2.0 - a mobile app that keeps you connected to your data wherever and whenever you have an Internet connection. With it, you can access the folders shared in your home network from your Android or iOS smartphone or via a personalized URL
- IPv6 - modern support for IPv6 addresses that will soon become the norm, replacing IPv4.
- VPN - you can set the router to work as a VPN server, and you can also use it to turn your network-connected devices into VPN-enabled clients, without additional VPN software required.
- Network Tools - for analyzing the network and identifying what's wrong. They are useful when you need to troubleshoot problems.
- Dual WAN - excellent for both small businesses and professionals who require always-on Internet connections. You can also use a dual WAN to improve the quality of your internet connection and get the best possible performance.
- DDNS - a service that allows you to connect to the router from the internet, even if your internet provider gives you a dynamic public IP address.
Another great extra is the availability of the ASUS Router mobile app for Android and iOS. With it, you can configure most of the features found on this router, straight from your smartphone or tablet. However, the app works only if the smartphone (or tablet) is connected to the WiFi that is broadcast by the router. It doesn't work from anywhere on the internet, and this limits its usefulness.
The ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 wireless router packs many premium features and tools that will be useful to its users. Some of them are aimed at gamers, others at professionals, and many of them are useful to any user who wants more than just WiFi.
What is your opinion about ASUS RT-AC86U?
At the end of this review, you know our view of the ASUS RT-AC86U AC2900 wireless router. Before closing this article, we would like to learn your opinion about this router. Are you interested in buying it? Do you appreciate its features? Don't hesitate to comment below.
Discussion (30)
i got the RT-AX88U it’s a beast! even with my VPN turned on it does not slow down my Internet speed. I love it though i don’t trust the AiProtection. could be a privacy issue but i turned it on anyway
Just making a post regarding the default region for Asian sourced routers.
You know you’ve got one of these routers when after pressing reset, Chinese characters appear in the initial setup screens. You can of course change the language back to English after setup, but it is a bit of a hassle trying to work out what to do!
I think the region default value is sometimes pushed back to “China” for these routers when you upgrade or reset, so if you are having problems with one of these routers, check the following
– Log into your router
– Press Wifi option (bottom left)
– Press Professional tab (top right)
– In the field for frequency, select 2.4 Ghz (use drop down button)
– Page down and change the region to suit your locale e.g. for me in the UK, I changed it from its default value of “China” to “Europe” and this fixed various problems like the 2.4 GHz not working and AIMesh not connecting
To get AI mesh to work, I had to use the Asian sourced router as the main router ans set its 2.4 GHz default region to “Europe” and then this enabled my other Europe sourced routers to be easily added into AIMESH
Can you give me a reason for the better performance of the TP-Link Archer C9 versus the ASUS RT-AC86U?
We did not compare Archer C9 with ASUS RT-AC86U.
But you have tested both, and your results don’t lie, when I put your results side by side, you can clearly see that for example the wireless 5GHz speed is better in the Archer C9 than in the RT-AC86U.
Based on this fact, can you think of why a 2 years old high-end router (RT-AC86U) performs worst than a much older one, 5 years old or so (Archer C9).
Your database: Reviewing The TP-LINK Archer C9 AC1900 Wireless Dual Band Gigabit Router VS Reviewing ASUS RT-AC86U: High-end performance and great hardware!
Our review for TP-Link Archer C9 is very old. At that point, we tested v1, which is no longer sold. In the meantime, that router has arrived at the hardware revision V5, which we did not evaluate. We would rather not comment about a router that we did not test.
Would you recommend this router over the ASUS RT-AC88U? I am having a hard time separating the 2 as most the specs seem the same
Yes. I do. This is a newer model with better hardware and better performance. Go for AC86U instead of AC88U.
I plan on purchasing this router. The speed and security made up my mind.
I tried several AC86U (2900) units and agree with most of your findings, but had to return them because port forwarding never worked. Did many things (factory reset, changed config files, downgraded and upgraded firmware, etc.) ASUS tech support had no idea why this was happening and could not help. Have multiple other prior ASUS routers and they port forward fine. Had to return the two 2900 units. If this PF failure is fixed, will re-purchase the 2900.
Hey, had the same issue with two 86u’s took back the first… it really seemed glitchy, slow page refresh etc, no port forwarding worked.. got the second one, did all the standard stuff, firmware, etc, even flashed Merlen whcih has powered my N66u for years.. dropping lan, port forward sketchy at best. Read a post saying to try FW V 20648.. viola! tis stable… two weeks of screwing around, no help from asus. Cheers, P.)
Current Version : 3.0.0.4.384_20648-g21e3702
Thanks for sharing the solution that you have found.
The iOS app works well any where in the world to connect and control your router remotely. Please connect your article.
The router app DOES WORK outside the network if you set up the Asus DDNS service
Hi thanks for the review.
Do you know if it has capabilities to block content on a category based rather than URL’s ?
Yes, it does. And it works very well because it is cloud-based and maintained by Trend Micro.
Great news – thank you.
Is this under AiProtection / Parental Controls ?
Sorry I also commented on the ASUS 4G-AC68U review.
I worked out that the category filtering is per user/device rather than a global setting that is applied to all user/devices. Do you recommend any other devices that have the category filtering feature that contain a sim slot ?
I have not tested other routers that work with SIM cards.
Yes. It is there.
I bought the 86U to replace the 87U, and measured the signal strength with Ekahau heatmapper on the ground floor and in the garden, about 250 square meters. I could see no improvement over the 87U, nor did it worse.
Only file transfers from wifi to LAN were about 35% faster.
The only adavantage may become the AIMesh feature, WHEN and IF it becomes supported for the 87U and then using the both together.
I’m thinking about sending the 86U back, it is an ok router but not worth the money when upgrading from the 86U.
Other advantages are: 86U can handle many more wireless clients than 87U, due to newer, more powerful hardware. On new PCs with modern wireless network cards, you will also see a speed improvement on WiFi. Also, the security you get is better than on the 87U.
Okay, thanks for your comment.
Meanwhile, ik kept the 86U because the wifi speed is really amazing, I keep getting downloadspeeds on the Internet of about 190 Mbps to 200 Mbps, max of my ISP, where the 87U never tops the 125 Mbps. I use the 87U as an AP at the second floor now and hope for AIMesh support in future.
Also, I tested the much appraised Netgear R7800 Nighthawk, but its speeds where seldom half of those of the 86U, and its Wifi range is about 30% less
I replaced an Airport Extreme 6 with the ASUS RT-AC86U; not really comparable. The unit did come from China (box marked in Chinese) so it did take a while. I upgraded the firmware and installed my network parameters. I am very pleased with the performance though I am not a gamer and there are seldom more than 2 laptops active wirelessly. There are no wired connections. My house is large and the remote signal strength is excellent. It arrived 1 month ago.
I’m glad that you enjoy using this router. 😉
how fast is the speed from usb 3.1 storage to wifi?
is it really around 100 MB/s read and write as asus promises?
We have a section with the speed of the USB port. Please read it.
What about power consumption?
Just bought it – seems hard to get hold of this router.
It was initially launched in a small batch. We expect this to change very soon and for ASUS to increase availability.