ASA Ban EE UK Broadband Ads for Misleading Wi-Fi 7 Router Claims UPDATE
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has banned several TV, radio, paid-for social media and digital poster adverts for UK ISP EE’s (BT) home broadband service. This occurred after they were found to have made “misleading” claims about the capabilities of the provider’s new Wi-Fi 7 Smart Hub Pro router and Smart Wi-Fi Pro device.
The new Wi-Fi 7 capable router and wireless booster hardware was officially introduced in September 2024 (here). At the time, EE were still one of the only broadband ISPs in the UK market able to offer such kit, and the following month they launched a series of adverts to help promote that fact.
The adverts made various similar claims, which appeared to indicate that the use of the latest WiFi (wireless networking) standard would improve device performance: “When everyone’s caning the broadband, Wi-Fi 7 on EE makes every device work better, even yours”, said one advert, while small text added: “Works better vs previous Wi-Fi technology”. In another advert, EE claimed that “XBOX PLAYS BETTER ON WIFI 7” and so forth.
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The catch here is that Wi-Fi 7 can only really deliver its biggest improvements, such as when compared with older Wi-Fi 6 or 6E kit, if the devices it’s connecting to are also able to support the same Wi-Fi 7 standard. But most people don’t currently have any other Wi-Fi 7 capable devices in their homes.
In response Vodafone, CommunityFibre and 19 members of the public, who understood most devices available at the time the ads were seen did not support Wi-Fi 7, challenged whether the ads were misleading and the ASA ultimately upheld those complaints. In particular, the ASA noted that EE hadn’t provided enough credible evidence to substantiate all of their claims.
ASA Ruling (G24-1265502 EE Ltd t/a EE Ltd)
“We understood that, alongside the Wi-Fi 7 router, an extender was supplied as part of the package to extend the range of the router’s signal around the home. However, we considered that was not clear from the ad. We acknowledged that the claims in the ads were always qualified with the text “EE’s exclusive Smart Wi-Fi Pro”. While this implied the product was unique to EE and may have offered benefits that were not available from other Wi-Fi 7 routers, we did not consider that it clarified how the products worked. Although ad (b) referenced the router, none of the ads indicated that the Smart Wi-Fi Pro included both the router and the extender. We understood from EE that the ad claims were based on the performance of the two combined.
We understood the tests were designed to record the speed, consistency and reliability of the Wi-Fi connection between the router and a device. The results showed that both the Wi-Fi 5 and Wi-Fi 6 devices’ broadband connection speeds were faster, more consistent and more reliable when connecting to the internet using EE’s new Smart Hub Pro and extender, compared to their older hub and extender which did not have Wi-Fi 7.
However, while the devices tested varied in generations of Wi-Fi (Wi-Fi 5, 6 and 7) and demonstrated the backward compatibility of the new router with devices which were not Wi-Fi 7-enabled, they were all laptops. This limited testing scope, confined to a single device type, meant that the evaluation did not encompass a broad range of devices, such as smartphones, tablets, smart TVs, gaming consoles or smart home gadgets. The tests also did not evaluate device performance while multiple devices were being used simultaneously. Consequently, we considered that the testing was not adequate to substantiate the claims in the context of ads (a), (b) and (c) that “every device works better”, as consumers would understand them.
Ads (c) and (d) referenced devices such as the Xbox and Google devices, including the Google Nest Hub and Google Nest Home. Because those devices were not included in the testing, we considered the evidence was not adequate to substantiate stated and implied claims that those devices performed better. We also understood that none of those devices were Wi-Fi 7-enabled devices.
Because the evidence was not adequate to substantiate the claims as consumers would interpret them, we concluded that the claim “EE’s new Wi-Fi 7 router makes every device work better” in ads (a), (b) and (c) as well as the references to specific devices in ads (c) and (d), were misleading.”
As usual, the ASA banned the adverts and told EE not to claim that “EE’s new Wi-Fi 7 router makes every device work better” or make similar claims, “unless they held adequate evidence to support the claims“. They also must not claim that specific devices “work better on Wi-Fi 7” unless they held adequate evidence to support them.
UPDATE 9:03am
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We’ve had a comment from EE.
An EE Spokesperson said:
“As the UK’s only major provider to offer a Wi-Fi 7 router, the ASA agreed that our testing proved our Wi-Fi 7 router and Smart Hub Pro allowed faster, more consistent and more reliable speeds around the home for Wi-Fi 7 enabled devices and older devices with Wi-Fi 5 and Wi-Fi 6. However, they considered we should have tested on a greater range of devices. We take compliance very seriously and are now updating our advertising in line with the ASA’s findings.”
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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Unfortunately by the time a judgement is made the advert has already been out for a while and everyone has seen it. Until these judgements start coming with some hefty fines it’s a case of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.
Seems like somebody crom different company jealous.. Or on purpose been playing dumb..
The new WiFi 7 routers are backward compatible with WiFi 6E or 6 or 5..
And i believe many English ppl love latest iPhones and Samsung s24 ultras which DO SUPPORT WiFi 7..or backward compatible with 6e or 6 or 5
I just purchased ee 5g WiFi 7 router from ebay just for 100 and flawlessly running WiFi 7 on S24u and on my laptop with WiFi 7 Intel BE200 WiFi
I also have wifi6e on another laptop and speeds are massive even on that which released in 2020?
I like c’moon it’s been like 5 years and it supposed to be normal standard long time ago
I suppose you could argue that by using the new WiFi 7 router + extenders around the home it would indeed improve performance to all devices, as WiFi 7 brings benefits when it comes to extending WiFi and by extension would improve the available bandwidth for all devices.
But that’s only if a customer uses and relies WiFi extenders.
Isn’t that the same ASA who has been allowing for years misleading advertising, by allowing telecoms to call copper “fibre broadband”? For an example, see https://www.bt.com/broadband/fibre
Nailed it.
EE fanboys: why would O2 do this?
O2 Fanboys:
If they had asked me I would have told them I had that service with that kit and I got 1595mbps on my 16 Pro Max all around the house. I left due to the 12-1am disconnection issue and so I could live mobile. It worked well and if people don’t have the right devices they shouldn’t expect higher!
The “Xbox plays better on WiFi 7” was always puzzling because the Xbox Series S and X only come with WiFi 5 or 6E on the refreshed X
I complained to the ASA about these adverts. Until reading this article, I had no idea that they were basing the claim that it makes ‘every device better’ on the fact that they provide a range extender. It is heavily implied in the adverts that having a WiFi 7 router makes ‘every device better’ which is plainly false, as the device needs to support WiFi 7 to benefit from it.
While I’m glad the adverts have been banned, I’m dissapointed it’s taken so long to take action. EE have likely sold several of these packages based on the misleading adverts.
I honestly think that all of these ads should be banned.
EE is an ISP, and it frankly absurd to promote their broadband deals by talking about WiFi routers which any customer of any ISP can attach to their modems.
People will and do leave the ISP as a result of it having “bad wifi” from the supplied router.
So an ISP advertising its services based on its (routers) Wifi performance and “enhanced” parental controls such as the ability to turn off wifi to certain (kids) devices at bedtime and control the wifi with an exclusive app works – even if these functions and better ones are available on most after market bog-standard routers
Yet they’re still allowed to advertise gpon as being able to provide 900 meg download speeds even though it’s 2.4 gigs shared between 32 different connections. This means the Max speed is actually 75 meg so no better than if you were close to the cabinet on an fttc connection basically. They also throttle your access to all streaming services 24/7. This is my experience anyway.
Your anecdotal experience is the opposite of my own. I have gigabit at home with EE broadband and can *always* get the full throughout at any time of day. I think in the 4 years of having this connection I’ve seen it drop to 600-700Mbps for a few hours due to a CoD Warzone update contesting the network.
I also have 4 family members on 4 separate Openreach connections who have the same experience as me and are all with Vodafone broadband.
Reliable and consistent has always been my experience, far above CityFibre’s constantly congested network and much better than FTTC.
“Dad, . . . what’s 600-700Mbps ?”
“That son, is the rate of accretion in the CEO’s remuneration portfolio, on a bad day, with a head wind”.
@karl your experience is anecdotal too, just because it works great for you doesn’t mean everyone else is going to have the same experience