How many devices can be connected to a router

How many devices can be connected to one router?

A router (English: Router, also known as a router) is a telecommunications network device that provides two important mechanisms: routing and forwarding, which can determine the route that data packets take from the source to the destination. Path (transmission path from host to host), this process is called routing; moving the data packet at the input end of the router to the appropriate output end of the router (carried out inside the router), this is called forwarding. Routing works on the third layer of the OSI model - the network layer, such as Internet Protocol (IP).

Enterprise-level routers can be divided into three types of ABC networks, which are as follows:

Class A network uses 1.0.0.0-126.0.0.0, allowing 126 network segments, each network allows approximately 16.7 million hosts, usually allocated to networks with a large number of hosts;

Class B networks use 128.0.0.0-191.255.0.0, allowing 16384 network segments, Each network allows 65533 hosts, which is suitable for networks with many nodes;

Class C networks use 192.0.0.0-223.255.255.0, and the network allows 254 hosts. This is generally used by home routers. network type.

There is no need to talk about enterprise-level routers. Let’s talk about how many devices a home router can actually connect to. Under normal circumstances, the service address of home routers is 192.168.0.1 (192.168.1.1). This address serves as both the DNS of this network segment and the DHCP server. The maximum IP address is 192.168.1.254. Excluding the first IP address, a maximum of 253 network devices can theoretically be connected.

#However, due to many factors in actual use, the actual number of connections will not be so many. For example, friends who have used Linksys routers will find that the DHCP address pool of Linksys routers is 192.168.1.100~192.168.1.199. It is recommended that the maximum number of connections does not exceed 100. The DHCP address pool of many domestic routers generally reserves 50 IP addresses for daily use.

And home router chip manufacturers will also limit the maximum number of connections of the router for stability reasons. For example, Netgear's R7800 manufacturer limits the maximum number of simultaneous connections to 64 in terms of chips. After this device data is exceeded, even if the WiFi password is correct, it will prompt that the network cannot be connected.

The most important point is that the bandwidth of home broadband has the most severe restrictions on home routers. According to the barrel law, the shortcomings are often not the router itself, but more about the effect of today's broadband. Even if a home router can connect 64 devices, if 10 devices use the network at the same time, there will be lag. In fact, the recommended number of connections for this router should be less than 10 devices.

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