Besides releasing wireless gaming routers in the category rog (republic of game), asus has also released several models of wireless mobile gaming routers and the most popular one is asus rtax86u. How the wireless gaming router competition between asus and netgear?
Asus wireless gaming routers
Asus categories wireless gaming into two, republic of game (rog) rapture and wireless mobile gaming routers.
This ROG gaming router is designed to provide maximum gaming experience. In normal circumstances all types of devices generally compete with all connected devices. For this reason, Asus provides special features and specs so that you can get smooth and responsive gaming experience even though the connected devices on the network is quite dense as is offered in the ROG Rapture Routers category such as premium product asus rog raptured axe11000.
In addition of rog rapture wireless gaming category, asus releases wireless mobile gaming routers and one of them is asus ax86u gaming router, aka asus rtax86u.
What this product does
Asus rtax86u is designed as a wireless gaming router for online mobile gaming with your mobile / phone devices, or with your game consoles. Actually Asus also releases another model asus rtax82u which is also specially designed for mobile gaming, even though you can also play online gaming with your game console as good as mobile gaming. What are the spec differences between these two wifi-6 gaming routers?
Asus rtax86u vs rtax82u
The price difference between the two models is not too much; rtax86u is tagged with around $20 more expensive than rtax82u. You can learn more details what the spec differences between the two models, table 1 below shows you spec comparison table between the two models.
You may also like to see new Asus RT-BE96U BE19000 wifi 7 router, next generation of wifi 7 technology.
Wifi capacity
Both models basically work at the same network segment, the same speed @5ghz band and slightly different speed @2.4Ghz band.
The first difference is the number of streams @2.4GHz radio band, rtax86u delivers 3×3 MU-MIMO streams @2.4GHz radio band while rtax82u is 2×2 MU-MIMO. So aggregated speeds @2.4GHz is also different as shown on signal rates row in the table 1. On the radio band @ 5GHz both models provide the same speed up to 4804Mbps, 4×4 MU-MIMO like other ax6000 wifi-6 routers in general such as Linksys mr9600 ax6000 router which also comes with the same 4×4 MU-MIMO @5GHz band.
Your desktop computers that come with wifi-6 adapter such as Archer tx3000x PCI-e adapter connect optimally to either asus or Linksys routers up to 2400Mbps @5GHz band. And if there two desktop computers installed with this adapter, the router can deliver two data streams simultaneously to eliminate the buffers and reduce network latency. That’s what 4×4 mu-mimo feature works.
To support signal coverage there is slightly different in antenna design where the ax86u does not design four external antennas like the ax82u, but one antenna is onboard internal and certainly does not reduce the coverage considering this model is in the form of a tower factor.
Port interfaces
There is another difference in the number of Ethernet ports from each model where rtax86u is equipped with 6x gigabit ports while rtax82u is only 5x gigabit ports. With rtax82u model there is one LAN port specifically designed as LAN port with gaming priority. You can connect your game console to this port and it will get priority game traffic automatically.
Unlike asus rtax82u, asus rtax86u comes with separate 2.5Gbps auto sensing multi-gigabit port which can be used either as a WAN or LAN port with multi-gigabit speeds. If you have cable modem that come with two Gigabit ethernet ports and support link aggregation such as netgear cm1100, you can configure your router to support multi-gig internet speed by combining 1.0gbps wan port and port-4 lan port. You can connect both port using two utp cables and connect to each of the two ethernet ports of the cable modem.
From the navigation panel you can click WAN and select Internet Connection tab => on the basic config you need to enable the “enable wan aggregation” by selecting Yes radio button.
Or you can enable 2.5gbps port as wan port for multi-gig internet speed and connect to cable modem with 2.5gbps port such as Surfboard s33 or netgear cm2000. So you don’t to configure aggregated wan port to reduce cable clutter and free all the lan ports for wired connected devices.
You may compare with other Asus model – the Asus rt-ax89x which comes with 10Gbps BaseT for WAN/LAN port.
Table 1 Asus rt-ax86u vs ax82u
| Model | Asus rt-ax86u | Asus rt-ax82u |
| Wifi | Simultaneous dual band ax5700 | Simultaneous dual band ax5400 |
| Signal rates | 4804Mbps @5GHz 4×4 up to 861Mbps @2.4GHz 3×3 | 4804Mbps @5GHz 4×4 574Mbps @2.4GHz 2×2 |
| Antennas | 3x external antennas 1x Internal PCB Antenna | 4x External antennas |
| Ethernet ports | 1x Gigabit WAN port 1x 2.5G BaseT for WAN/LAN 4x Gigabit LAN ports | 1x Gigabit WAN port 3x Gigabit LAN port 1x Gigabit gaming port |
| USB port | 2x USB 3.2 gen 1 | 1x USB 3.2 gen 1 |
| Processor | 1.8 GHz quad-core processor 256 MB Flash + 1 GB RAM | 1.5Gz tri-core processor 256 MB flash + 512 MB RAM |
| Price (Aug 2022 in Amazon) | $279.99 | $229.00 |
There is apparent difference from the physical appearance where the rtax82u is equipped with Aura RGB which can display colorful lighting that can be customized via the Asus router app, and you can turn it off if you don’t like the colorful rays of this Aura rgb.
Technically, asus ax86u gaming router comes with higher spec than asus rtax82u, even though ax82u add a unique Aura rgb lighting display.
To support multi-gig internet plan ax86u is preference you can either configure teaming wan port or enable 2.5gbps wan port. Now, let’s take this preference one and compare it with Linksys ax6000 wifi 6 routers (aka Linksys mr9600).
Asus rt-ax86U vs Linksys mr9600
How good Asus rtax86u is compared with one of its competing similar products such as Linksys mr9600 wireless ax6000 router which the price is more expensive? See also lower model of Linksys mr7350 ax1800 wifi6 router.
Table 2 shows you spec comparison table between asus rtax86u and Linksys ax6000 mr9600 router. See that not many spec differences between the two products. Number of data streams each of the product can deliver is different @2.4GHz band. Linksys ax6000 mr9600 comes with 4×4 MU-MIMO while asus ax86u gaming router comes in 3×3 MU-MIMO. Both ax86u and mr9600 are also ready with new wireless security encryption – WPA3.
Port interfaces
Although these two products are equipped with the same two USB 3.0 ports, the number of Ethernet ports is different. The RT-ax86u is equipped with a multi-gig 2.5Gbps port you can use it either as LAN or WAN port in addition to the same 5x Gigabit Ethernet LAN and WAN ports. If you subscribe to a multi-gig speed fiber optic, the 2.5Gbps port can be used as a WAN port connected to your ISP. You can also use this multi-gig port to connect to a NAS with the same multi-gig connection such as QNAP TS-932PX-4G-US.
Another way to support multi-gig internet plan, you can also enable aggregated link wan port by combining 1.0gbps wan port and port lan #4 and connect them to cable modem that supports two ethernet ports and teaming ports such as netgear cm1100. With Linksys ax6000 you don’t option for wan teaming port.
The processor type embedded in each the product is the also the same, quad core 1.8GHz processor. Take a look at the following spec comparison table between asus ax86u gaming router and Linksys ax6000 wireless routers below.
Security protection
Some folks may not be so aware with the security of their home wifi network to protect all attacks from the dangers of the wild internet. So it’s not surprising that Asus provides added value to its line of routers with the aiprotection pro system (for the mid and premium product lines) or airportection classic (for the entry level product line) for free. On the other hand with Linksys you need to subscribe similar protection product.
Now, take a look at the presented spec comparison table between asus ax86u gaming router and Linksys ax6000 routers.
The processor type embedded in each the product is the also the same, quad core 1.8GHz processor. Take a look at the following spec comparison table between Asus ax5700 and Linksys ax6000 wireless routers below.
Table 2 Asus rt-ax86u vs Linksys mr9600
| Model | Asus rtax86u | Linksys mr9600 |
| Wifi | Simultaneous dual band ax5700 with MU-MIMO 2.4 GHz 3 x 3 5 GHz 4 x 4 | Simultaneous dual band ax6000 With 4×4 MU-MIMO |
| Wifi speeds | up to 861 Mbps @2.4GHz up to 4804 Mbps @5GHz | up to 1147 Mbps @2.4GHz up to 4804 Mbps @5GHz |
| Antennas | External antenna x 3 Internal PCB antenna x 1 | 4x adjustable external antennas |
| Ethernet Ports | RJ45 for 10/100/1000 BaseT for WAN x 1, RJ45 for 10/100/1000 BaseT for LAN x 4, RJ45 for 2.5G BaseT for WAN/LAN x 1 Support wan aggregation | 1x Gigabit WAN port 4x Gigabit LAN ports |
| USB | 2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 | 2x USB 3.0 ports |
| Processor | 1.8 GHz quad-core processor Memory 256 MB Flash, 1 GB RAM | 1.8 GHz quad-core processor |
| Features | Asus AiMesh support Asus AiProtection Pro by Trend Micro WPA3 support | WPA2/WPA3 Mixed Personal |
| Price (Aug 2022 in Amazon) | $279.99 | $299.99 |
The price tagged is around $249.99 in Amazon up to Aug 2022. The price is always fluctuating by time. Click the product’s link below to see current price, read more product’s detail, customer review and SHOP the product in Amazon (#ads).
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Related products
See also premium products netgear raxe500 vs asus axe11000 wireless gaming routers. Both wireless routers based on the latest wifi 6e technology.
For middle range wireless gaming router, you may also consider newer model tplink archer gx90 ax6600 or netgear nighthawk xr1000.