- Enterprises skipping on-site Wi-Fi validation during upgrades face higher costs and degraded performance, says an Ookla executive
- Ookla launched Speedtest Pulse this month, a MagSafe-attached handheld that makes Wi-Fi diagnostics accessible to users at all levels of technical skill
- Healthcare Wi-Fi is emerging as essential Wi-Fi infrastructure as cellular connectivity remains poor in hospitals and medical devices move to wireless
CISCO LIVE 2026, LAS VEGAS — Enterprises upgrading their Wi-Fi networks are leaving money on the table by skipping on-site validation — and the cost of that shortcut is often higher than the cost of doing it right the first time, according to Ookla.
As organizations move from older Wi-Fi gear to new hardware — say, from access points supporting 2.4 and 5 GHz to ones supporting 6 GHz — they assume existing AP placement will still work. That can be an expensive mistake, said Matt Starling, Ookla senior director of product marketing, in an interview.
"They think they can potentially take out their old, existing AP locations and put in those new model APs and it's going to work well," Starling said, "whereas in reality, without going onsite and actually validating, walking around and understanding if it's going to work, there can be a bit of a gap between the expectation of whether the previous design will be fit for tomorrow's new requirements."
The fix, after the fact, is more expensive than a pre-deployment walkthrough would have been. Organizations that skip validation end up losing time, running new cables and adding access points they could have placed correctly at the outset.
"It's always a key critical element to go onsite, validate the new deployments to be sure they will actually meet requirements," Starling said. "If they just did that ahead of time, it actually would save them a lot of time."
Speedtest Pulse lowers the barrier to validation
Ookla is launching Speedtest Pulse this month, a handheld device designed to make Wi-Fi diagnostics accessible to a much broader range of users than previous tools could reach.
The Pulse attaches to the back of a phone via MagSafe and incorporates a Wi-Fi 7 radio. It runs a Speedtest and a suite of additional diagnostic tests, then provides recommendations for improving the network. It can be left running continuously, monitoring performance and flagging issues that can be addressed remotely.
The vendor also provides the Sidekick 2, a previously released tool roughly the size of a Walkman that was built for trained wireless engineers. The Pulse is aimed at a much wider audience.
"You literally just connect it to your phone, you open the app and press go, and it runs a Speedtest, and then runs all of the other tests, and then provides the diagnostics and the recommendations to improve the network, so whether you're junior level or expert level, it's very, very easy to use," Starling said.
The target user is essentially anyone who touches a network in the field. "We imagine it being in the bag of pretty much every ISP technician," Starling said — but the audience extends to IT professionals and even non-technical end users who need to troubleshoot their own environment.
How telcos and CSPs use Ookla on customer premises
Carriers and other communications service providers deploy Ookla tools to design, validate and optimize wireless networks at customer sites.
The work involves determining the best locations for access points, how to configure them and where potential sources of interference may arise, Starling said. Done well, it gives CSPs a repeatable methodology for delivering reliable Wi-Fi to enterprise customers and a tool to diagnose problems when performance falls short.
The Speedtest Pulse fits directly into that workflow. CSP technicians can run diagnostics on customer premises without requiring a specialist wireless engineer on every site visit. The device's continuous monitoring capability also allows problems to be identified and addressed remotely, reducing the need for repeat truck rolls.
The challenge of Wi-Fi at scale
The validation problem sits within a broader operational challenge. Wi-Fi is now the dominant form of connectivity in most enterprise environments, but it is also one of the harder technologies to manage reliably at scale, Starling said.
"Having access to the tools to be able to design, deploy, validate, and keep that network performing well is the customer's biggest challenge," he said. The difficulty compounds because Wi-Fi environments are inherently dynamic — new devices, new standards and constantly changing physical environments all affect performance.
A conference center — like the one hosting CiscoLive — illustrates the point. The layout of booths in an exhibit hall changes week to week, creating new obstructions that affect signal propagation, Starling said. What worked last week may not work this week.
Healthcare: when Wi-Fi becomes life-safety infrastructure
Hospitals present a particularly difficult RF environment, and cellular connectivity is typically poor inside them — especially in the U.K. That means clinical staff rely on Wi-Fi for communication, and an expanding array of medical devices transmit over wireless networks.
"Having a good performing Wi-Fi network is not just business critical, but sometimes it can be the difference between life and death," Starling said.
Medical devices — patient monitors, infusion pumps, imaging equipment — increasingly communicate over Wi-Fi. A network that degrades under load or fails a validation check is not just an IT problem; it is a patient safety risk.
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