WiFi calling often works poorly due to interference from wireless signals, internet connection quality, and the WiFi network's ability to handle real-time voice calls.
The WiFi connection is inherently unstable, unlike a network cable that remains firmly anchored. Sudden signal drops or micro-cuts often occur due to interference from other wireless devices such as Bluetooth, baby monitors, or even microwaves. Even the neighbors' networks can disrupt your connection, especially in a densely populated apartment area. The device you are using (phone, tablet, laptop) can also constantly switch from one frequency or router to another. These rapid changes easily lead to a choppy connection during voice or video calls.
When too many devices use your home WiFi network at the same time, each one has to compete for a piece of bandwidth, like a highway jammed during rush hour. As a result, the connection becomes slow, choppy, and you might even experience dropouts during WiFi calls. Streaming videos, playing online games, or downloading large files from multiple devices at once consumes a significant portion of your bandwidth. Consequently, voice calls require a constant bandwidth and are particularly sensitive to this congestion. Adding to this is the fact that your router may be poorly configured or outdated, which doesn't help: it may struggle to efficiently distribute the signal among all devices, further exacerbating the issue.
If your phone or router uses an outdated WiFi standard, it can negatively affect the quality of your calls. Some WiFi standards don't handle voice communications well, so even with a good signal strength, you may experience interruptions or annoying delays. Similarly, poor settings on your box or smartphone, such as incorrectly configured QoS (Quality of Service) settings, can prioritize the wrong traffic and lead to unstable calls. Low-quality or incompatible hardware can also cause interoperability issues, resulting in unexpected connection drops or choppy audio during conversations.
Obstacles like thick walls, metal doors, or even just large furniture seriously weaken your WiFi network. The more solid or dense objects your signal has to pass through, the more strength it loses. Reinforced concrete is particularly bad because its metal framework acts almost like a barrier. Very often, a simple drywall partition is still passable, but the accumulation of several walls gradually kills your connection, reducing your audio quality and causing those infamous call dropouts. Even water, such as in aquariums or pipes embedded behind your walls, absorbs some of the waves! Not to mention that the metal found in appliances (fridges, dishwashers) deflects or reflects the signal in unpredictable ways, making WiFi unstable.
High latency is when the voice arrives with a delay during a conversation. You’ve probably noticed that strange moment when we interrupt each other unintentionally: it’s because the audio message takes too long to travel from one phone to another. The main cause is often a slower routing of data over WiFi compared to a wired or traditional mobile network. And when there is also packet loss, some small parts of the sent data completely disappear along the way. This results in those annoying voice dropouts where you have to ask your conversation partner to repeat half of their sentences. When latency and packet loss are too high, communicating clearly becomes quite complicated.
Your smartphone can automatically switch between WiFi and mobile network during a call to maintain the connection. Unfortunately, these switches can cause brief interruptions or call dropouts.
Some electronic devices such as microwave ovens, old cordless phones, or baby monitors use the same frequency band as your WiFi (2.4 GHz), which can significantly disrupt the quality of your WiFi calls.
Switching your WiFi to the 5 GHz frequency (if your device is compatible) can reduce the impact of interference and improve the quality of the signal and WiFi calls, especially in densely populated urban environments.
The position of your WiFi router greatly influences the stability of WiFi calls. Placing your router at a higher elevation, away from other electronic devices, and without direct obstacles significantly improves the signal.
WiFi calling allows communication in areas where traditional network coverage (2G/3G/4G/5G) is weak or non-existent. This solution generally provides better sound quality in locations with a stable high-speed Internet connection.
Make sure to stay close to the WiFi router, limit the number of devices connected to your network at the same time, use a less congested WiFi band (for example, switch from 2.4 GHz to 5 GHz), or consider installing a WiFi signal booster or a mesh network.
No, not all smartphones necessarily offer the 'WiFi calling' feature. This depends on both your device (only certain recent models), your mobile operator, the plan or subscription you choose, as well as the optional settings enabled on your phone.
Electrical devices such as microwaves, cordless home phones, security cameras, and even some heating systems or Bluetooth devices can disrupt the WiFi signal. Moving away from these devices or reducing their number generally helps limit interference.
The sound quality may decline due to a temporary instability in the WiFi network, temporary traffic congestion, or interferences caused by physical obstacles or other devices operating on similar frequencies.
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