Wifi Booster or Cell Booster for internet/ coastal cruising?

[wildflower20]

My wife and I are planning to work aboard this summer and into the fall.  We'll be cruising up the northeast coast of the US during the summer and then making our way south in the fall.
I'm trying to understand all of the options out there for getting reliable internet aboard.  The Wifi Boosters seem most popular but if we're moving from anchorage to anchorage, I wonder about our chances of actually finding "available" wifi networks.  Any advice or wisdom from those who have already done this search/ project?
I've looked at the Wave Wifi Antenna's, the Cellular Boosters, GoogleFi, and all sorts of others.
Chris

[Caxton]

If you have good cell coverage, use your phone as a hot spot. Depending on your plan, that may be the easiest.

[Tafika II]

We use a WiFi Wave Rogue system with an internal router for all devices on board when signals are available. Most of the time we use T-Mobile hot spots as we have an unlimited data plan

[wildflower20]

Thank you Caxton and Tafika,
I just question the reliability of the hot spot for things like online conferencing but maybe it's ok?
Tafika... if you are cruising from place to place, how often is it that you find there is no open wifi network to connect to?

[Tafika II]

I find Hot Spots faster than WiFi and may be OK for live streaming, but it not consistent. WiFi slow in most places. If I need to download or live stream, I find some internet store on shore.

[jy51]

I agree with others here that say 4G is best.

I believe that using 4G data is the way forward, its more reliable, accessible and normally better speeds than wifi connections.

Take out a data only contract, buy a 4/5G booster/router with a sims slot, like a "TP-Link Archer MR200 WiFi 4G Router" and you have a WiFi connection for all your iPads and laptops.

Add a wifi booster, set up for your home marina's wifi and switch over to the 4G data when cruising.

[vasko]

I constantly works on board the whole red summer in the Med - I use my iphone with my UK O2 SIM 100GB per month in EU and on 4G all video conferencing is perfect / actually way way better then flaky wifi in cafe’s

[Bora]

I have the Digital Yachts 4G Connect router and their WL510 wifi booster.  Basically anywhere that I would get a decent wifi signal is somewhere that I've also got better 4G so the wifi booster still hasn't been used in anger.

I have a legacy contract with Vodafone where I could pay for "passes" which allowed me unlimited data in different categories of use like social media, music etc....so i'm basically at £40 a month for unlimited 4G.  

So i'd say get a good 4G router and go with that.

[jy51]

Jun 20, 2020 6:16:11 GMT Bora said:

I have the Digital Yachts 4G Connect router and their WL510 wifi booster.  Basically anywhere that I would get a decent wifi signal is somewhere that I've also got better 4G so the wifi booster still hasn't been used in anger.

I have a legacy contract with Vodafone where I could pay for "passes" which allowed me unlimited data in different categories of use like social media, music etc....so i'm basically at £40 a month for unlimited 4G.  

So i'd say get a good 4G router and go with that.

I have a UK Vodafone contract, sims only with unlimited calls and data, great if my boat was based in the UK.  

When roaming outside the UK this is restricted to 25Gb,  I'm surprised Vasko has a UK contract that gives 100Gb while roaming, I though this was not available.  Vasko is this a data only contract, what are the restrictions?

[Bora]

If I were to “upgrade” my contract to a UK unlimited (which they’ve tried loads of times) id lose my passes and then the data use for my movies, music and social media would start counting towards my usage.
I’m on a 60GB contract but it never gets touched as the passes nullify my usage.

So holding on to this contract as long as possible.

[rxc]

I have been up and down the ICW a number of times, and reception is getting better, but there are still serious problems in NC back behind Cape Hatteras. Some of this depends on your cell phone company. I have not seen very many open WiFi signals for a very long time - they were common in 2008 when we first headed south, but since then people are much more concerned about security, and marinas about cost, so you will be depending on your cell phone quite a bit.

In marinas, it helps to have an external access point connected to a router inside the boat - but some WiFi access points in marinas do not like these setups, and can cut you off if they decide that several devices on one access point are cheating. I started with an Engenius router in 2008, and then progressed to a Ubituiti Bullet mounted on an external antenna on my arch. I now have a Bullet 2HP, but I think that there are better units. Antenna mounting height is important. If you are computer savvy you can do the whole thing for probably less than $200. But if you don't want to learn networking skills, you can buy a complete solution for about $350

I also have T-Mobile cell service with unlimited calls, text, and data, and it has been pretty good - not so much in NC or some places in the Chesapeake, but everywhere else, and I hope that it will get even better with the Sprint merger (except for the outage last week). TMobile also seems to be cool about tethering. AT&T used to be fussy.

South of Charleston, in the marshes of Georgia, reception can also be a problem. You will have no problems in FLorida, or in any of the towns along the way.