UniFi - Should I enable UniFi Band Steering?

Learn if you should enable UniFi band steering or not

Alex Lowe

Last updated: October 9, 2026

Should you enable UniFi band steering?

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Generally, no. It is advised to leave Band Steering disabled and design a network where a client can decide on its own which AP or band to connect to. Pretty much all modern WiFi clients that support Basic Service Set (BSS), will be able to decide for itself which AP or band is the most suitable.

However, in some use cases and deployments, you might find that enabling Band Steering can have some positive outcomes.

When a device is connected to an SSID that is apart of a BSS group, each client will have its own threshold it reaches when it starts looking for other APs nearby. For example, with Apple devices, this is -65dBm, but might be different for other devices.

Instead of using Band Steering, you can do things like making sure APs are in better locations, turning down the output power or even turning of 2.4GHz on some APs, if required.

The best way to really control and guarantee roaming and signal levels is to create a separate network for each band, or simply use 5GHz for important clients and leave 2.4GHz for specific use cases, such as IoT.

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