This is the time of year when the question, “What the hell am I going to get my parents for Christmas?” starts floating around in my head. They’re good sports, but how many more books do they really need? This year, they dropped the perfect idea in my lap when my dad complained on our weekly phone call that he couldn’t take meetings in his office because the internet kept dropping out.
Aha! A mesh router. My dad’s office is on the second floor — an insurmountable distance for the ISP-provided router they use. A good mesh router will be able to close that gap easily, and one of my favorites, Amazon’s Eero series, is heavily discounted for Black Friday.
The Eero Pro 6E delivered the fastest speeds of any Eero router we’ve tested at CNET, and it’s currently on sale for $400, down from $550. It’s built to take advantage of gigabit and even multi-gig connections — something my parents definitely don’t have.
The Eero 6 Plus, one of CNET’s top picks for mesh routers, is more their speed. It delivered speeds that were in the top 10 of the 30 or so mesh routers we’ve tested, and all of the routers ahead of it were significantly more expensive than the Eero 6 Plus. You can get it on sale right now for $195, $105 less than its list price.
Most importantly, Eero has a reputation for being simple to use, with an intuitive app that lets you adjust its settings. Part of their Christmas present will be me setting everything up for them, but I’d still like to know that they won’t feel intimidated by it if they want to make adjustments. I’ll admit this is a bit of a self-serving gift: A new mesh router means I’ll finally be able to watch Netflix in my childhood bedroom when I visit this year.
More Black Friday deals from CNET
