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SINGAPORE - Singapore is gearing up to providing $100 million worth of grants to help internet service providers defray the cost of the upgrade and encourage households to sign up for it. But consumers are questioning the need for 10Gbps given that they are not even getting close to the current 1Gbps they are paying for. The Straits Times looks at how users can maximise connection at home, and the common reasons users do not often get the network speeds that they pay for. Devices will not receive good reception when broadband signals from your Wi-Fi router pass through walls or, worse, metallic surfaces. Second, your router has to be able to transmit at speeds that match your broadband package, said principal analyst Sam Fenwick from analytics firm Opensignal. For higher speeds beyond 3.5Gbps, the Wi-Fi modem should support at least the Wi-Fi 6 standard. Modems with the latest standard, Wi-Fi 7, can manage at least 16 devices more efficiently and can deliver theoretical maximum speeds of anywhere up to 46Gbps – nearly five times faster than Wi-Fi 6. Even with such a router, users will not surf at anywhere close to 10Gbps even though major internet service providers (ISPs) including Singtel, StarHub, M1 and ViewQwest have already rolled out 10Gbps plans. The advertised 10Gbps speeds refer to wired connection speeds, and users will need compatible equipment, such as computers that support 10Gbps connections. Third, reception can be poor when the network is shared by others due to network congestion. The available bandwidth for each user drops when more devices use the network – especially for data-intensive activities like streaming or downloading media files, which typically peak in the evenings when more people are home.  Network interference can also occur when your network runs too close to a neighbour’s, causing the channels to overlap, especially in densely populated areas. This is particularly problematic when many networks use a similar band, like the 2.4GHz band, which has limited channels. Try these simple, and often free, steps to improve your connection before you splash the cash on new gear:  Users can look at the surfing speed estimates that ISPs are required to publish. that its typical local download speeds for wired connections under its 1Gbps plans reach up to 972.59Mbps; and it is up to 8,224.36Mbps for 10Gbps plans. the typical speed range for customers on its 1Gbps plans is between 888.7 and 903.7Mbps. For StarHub, it is between 888.99 and 957.05Mbps. Consumers can also refer to connectivity reports, such as those by OpenSignal, which assess and rank the broadband experience of major ISPs here. In OpenSignal’s latest , MyRepublic and ViewQwest were found to have the most consistent broadband experience. It is unlikely users will see 10Gbps speeds as they need to ensure that the devices connected are compatible, such as computers that are equipped with a 10G network interface card and Thunderbolt 10G ethernet adapter. The download speeds advertised by ISPs typically apply only to wired connections, and users often experience slower speeds when connected via Wi-Fi.