How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?
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@terryzb I've has similar issues with dropped calls or call audio issues. Been tracking it down for a while.
I've done two things. First I set up an Apple Automation Shortcut on my iPhone to place my iPhone into airplane mode when I get on the WiFi in my house. This stops my phone from trying switch back and forth from WiFi calling and back to cellular.
The bigger change I made was to pfSense. Under System/ Advanced/ Firewall & NAT I changed Firewall Optimization Options to Conservative.Today I was able to make a 2 hour call with no issues or drops.
Hopefully this change will improve your WiFi calling and not cause any other unexpected issues.
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@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
Any recommendations for a replacement? Something Unifi?
I've been using UniFi APs for about a year, and I like them, but certainly there are other credible choices.
Since you already have a router, you should be looking for devices that are just wifi APs not all-in-one router+AP, which eliminates most consumer-grade wifi gear. Aside from UniFi, I've heard good things about Omada and Cisco (but Cisco runs towards pricy). I've also had positive experience with Zyxel, although I'd mainly recommend them for single-AP installations because there's fewer options for managing multiple APs. If you are just replacing one Airport and have no expectation of needing more coverage, Zyxel is good because the APs have built-in web GUIs for configuration, whereas UniFi and (I think) other makes require some additional moving parts for configuring the APs. I used their NWA210AX model and liked it. They have both pricier and cheaper models.
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@Normandy214
Thank you for the tips. I set the Firewall Optimization to Conservative and will look at creating a Shortcut on the phone to force WiFi. -
@tgl
Thanks for the AP recommendations. I actually have 3 Airports because 1 won't quite cover the whole house. There's one Extreme in my office and then an Airport Express at the front of the house with a hard-wired backhaul to the Extreme, and another Express in the garage that extends via WiFi. The great thing about the Airports and the reason I've kept them for so long (too long??) is they just keep chugging along with the bare minimum of attention from me. -
I wonder if it's trying to use a different AP for some reason, incorrectly roaming.
You might try disabling two of them as a test.
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@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
@tgl
Thanks for the AP recommendations. I actually have 3 Airports because 1 won't quite cover the whole house.Okay, so this is starting to sound like a wifi optimization problem not a router problem. @stephenw10 may be on to something about the phone possibly roaming to one of the other Airports. As best I recall (it's been awhile) the Airports don't have any great way to see which clients are connected where, but have you checked the phone's wifi number-of-bars indicator when it's misbehaving?
A way to get a better indication is to download Apple's Airport Utility app if you don't have it already, and enable its wifi scanner functionality (you have to turn that on in Settings). Then the scan mode will give you actual RSSI numbers. It's a pretty bare-bones scanner but hey it's free...
Counterintuitive as it may sound, turning the APs' transmit power down may help with this, by discouraging the phone from roaming to a further-away AP. I don't recall how much configurability the Airports have for that, either.
If you do want to move forward with replacing the APs, I strongly recommend replacing all three, and that would make Zyxel not my first choice. UniFi APs would serve well though. You will also need something to configure/control them with. I don't recommend UniFi's phone app for that: it's very bare-bones. You can download their Network App for free for Windows, Mac, or Linux, or you can buy a "Cloud Key" to run basically that same software on dedicated hardware, or you can subscribe to their remote "cloud" management service. I'm not a fan of the last choice both because of the subscription fee and because I don't like opening remote-management holes in my firewall --- but people who need to manage multiple sites tend to like that.
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@tgl said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
@tgl
Okay, so this is starting to sound like a wifi optimization problem not a router problem. @stephenw10 may be on to something about the phone possibly roaming to one of the other Airports. As best I recall (it's been awhile) the Airports don't have any great way to see which clients are connected where, but have you checked the phone's wifi number-of-bars indicator when it's misbehaving?I have not but I will make a point next time.
A way to get a better indication is to download Apple's Airport Utility app if you don't have it already, and enable its wifi scanner functionality (you have to turn that on in Settings). Then the scan mode will give you actual RSSI numbers. It's a pretty bare-bones scanner but hey it's free...
I did have the app and I enabled scanning but honestly not sure what I'm looking at. Sitting in front of the Extreme, all the RSSI numbers are about the same for the 3 networks:
-41dBm home
-42dBm home5G
-41dBm guestCounterintuitive as it may sound, turning the APs' transmit power down may help with this, by discouraging the phone from roaming to a further-away AP. I don't recall how much configurability the Airports have for that, either.
I could not see a way to adjust power output in either the iOS or the Mac Airport Utility app.
If you do want to move forward with replacing the APs, I strongly recommend replacing all three, and that would make Zyxel not my first choice. UniFi APs would serve well though. You will also need something to configure/control them with. I don't recommend UniFi's phone app for that: it's very bare-bones. You can download their Network App for free for Windows, Mac, or Linux, or you can buy a "Cloud Key" to run basically that same software on dedicated hardware, or you can subscribe to their remote "cloud" management service. I'm not a fan of the last choice both because of the subscription fee and because I don't like opening remote-management holes in my firewall --- but people who need to manage multiple sites tend to like that.
Thank you for the perspective.
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@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
I did have the app and I enabled scanning but honestly not sure what I'm looking at. Sitting in front of the Extreme, all the RSSI numbers are about the same for the 3 networks:
-41dBm home
-42dBm home5G
-41dBm guestYeah, you'd expect the same signal strength (to within measurement error) for SSIDs being transmitted by the same radio. Those numbers look typical for an AP that you're quite close to. What I was curious about was whether you could see any signal from your other APs in your office. They'd be quite a bit lower, like -65dBm or even less.
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Similar to @terryzb and @Normandy214 I experience something similar and have been meaning to investigate.
I'm running pfSense+ 24.03 (about to upgrade to 24.11) and calls will fail unexpectedly after some extended duration.
In my case, I am running an iPhone 16Pro, my WiFi is provided by an Eero Pro mesh (in bridge mode), my phone carrier is AT&T, and my internet is gigabit symmetric fiber via Sonic. I will typically get > 350Mbps (speedtest) when on WiFi in most parts of my house. I do not experience similar issues with long-running videoconferencing sessions (incl facetime, webex, zoom, and teams) or possibly these platforms just handle degradation better.
I see no errors on status -> interfaces, status -> monitoring is flat.
(1) I will first also try updating System -> Advanced -> Firewall & NAT -> Firewall Optimization Options to Conservative....
(2) If this does not address my issue, next on the list of troubleshooting steps, I will disable "client steering" mode on my Eeros which is supposed to seamlessly pair my wifi devices to the optimal eero as I move around my house.
(3) If still no luck, I will also force airplane mode prior to a long call.
At some point, I will report back on my findings. Thanks for the recommendations, folks!
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@tgl
Here are the strengths and channels of the different addresses. The Airport Expresses don't have a MAC address printed on them so I can't tell which ones they are. It makes sense the -30 dBm is right next to me and -68 to -84 dBm are farther away.xx:A3 home -30 dBm Ch11 (AExtreme)
xx:74 home -71 dBm Ch11
xx:06 home -74 dBm Ch11xx:A4 home5G -36 dBm Ch157 (AExtreme)
xx:07 home5G -82 dBm Ch149
xx:75 home5G -84 dBm Ch60xx:A4 guest -30 dBm Ch11 (AExtreme)
xx:A5 guest -36 dBm Ch157
xx:06 guest -72 dBm Ch11
xx:07 guest -82 dBm Ch149
xx:74 guest -68 dBm (Ch obscured in screenshot)
xx:75 guest -84 dBm Ch60 -
@terryzb Okay. I assume the phone is using the home5G SSID? Minus-80-something dBm is well below the range where I'd believe the phone would want to connect to those signals, so we can probably eliminate the "phone randomly roams to one of your other APs" theory. That was never a great explanation anyway given that you say the download data direction keeps working well.
I'm pretty much back to the "time for new APs" position. The only thing I can think of that might not be the AP's fault is that -36dBm might actually be too much signal. Can you move further away from the AP (say about 10 feet) next time you're on a long call, and see if that changes anything?
BTW, another experiment to try is swapping around the APs to see if the problem stays with that AP.
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@tgl
The phone is almost always on just the home SSID. I think 5G was a relatively new thing when these Airports came out and I've never found the home5G SSID to be that reliable so I usually don't connect anything to it. -
@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
@tgl
The phone is almost always on just the home SSID.Oh, okay. I was focused on the 5GHz band because in my (high density urban) location the 2.4GHz band is saturated to the point of near unusability ;-).
In the 2.4G band your other APs are still below the phone's roam threshold (-70dBm), but only barely. It still seems unlikely that the phone would voluntarily move to one of those signals.
I don't really like your channel setup though: putting all the APs on the same channel is a recipe for causing unnecessary interference. Can you put them on different channels (preferably 1, 6, 11 in some order)?
Also, in 2.4G you are looking at a -30dBm signal which is really just unreasonably strong. I'd definitely try the move-away-from-the-AP experiment.
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@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
I don't really like your channel setup though: putting all the APs on the same channel is a recipe for causing unnecessary interference. Can you put them on different channels (preferably 1, 6, 11 in some order)?+1 on that! This is something a lot of people seem to miss. And it's not just the AP's that create interference, it's often times your clients.
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I have an iPhone 15 Plus using a UniFi A.P. with PfSense Plus 24.xx and I have WiFi calling as well because I'm in a poor cellular area. Got fiber to the house though, go figure.
Anyway, I use WiFi calling for 1-2 hours at times and it's rock solid. Hope that helps.
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@LunchBoxSteve Good to hear you aren't having any issues. Can you tell me what you have Firewall Optimization Options set to; System/ Advanced/ Firewall & NAT / Firewall Optimization Options
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@Normandy214 ... I have it set to "Normal"
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@tgl said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
I don't really like your channel setup though: putting all the APs on the same channel is a recipe for causing unnecessary interference. Can you put them on different channels (preferably 1, 6, 11 in some order)?
The Airports are all set to Auto for channel. I've never changed them. I'm not clear on how you would like them assigned them. Can you describe what you mean for the 3 Airports and the 3 SSIDs?
Also, in 2.4G you are looking at a -30dBm signal which is really just unreasonably strong. I'd definitely try the move-away-from-the-AP experiment.
Thanks for the suggestion, I will see if It's possible but it's a pretty small office.
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@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
The Airports are all set to Auto for channel. I've never changed them. I'm not clear on how you would like them assigned them. Can you describe what you mean for the 3 Airports and the 3 SSIDs?
You will only be able to change channels per-radio not per-SSID. There should be a single 2.4G channel setting per Airport. Unless you have near neighbors you want to avoid conflicting with, it doesn't matter which Airport you put on which channel --- just pick one for channel 1, one for channel 6, etc. Make sure the channel width is set to 20MHz, too (I forget whether the Airports ever offered the option of 40MHz, but you don't want to use that in the 2.4G band).
It looks like you already have the 5GHz channels spread apart a bit, but those could likely be tuned better as well. If you are using 80MHz channel width in 5GHz, then channels 149 and 157 actually overlap. That's better than having them be the very same channel, but it's not great. I'm surprised that nothing in the 36-48 channel range is being used: 36-48 and 149-161 are the normal 5GHz options in the US. The reason 60 is not in that set is that it's in the "DFS" spectrum where the AP is required to listen for radar pulses and shut itself down if it hears one. If you are in the boonies this isn't such a problem, but if you are near a major airport or weather radar station those channels can be pretty unusable. (I'm wondering now if this could have anything to do with your experience of 5GHz being unreliable. It is fine for most people.)
Actually, given that it doesn't sound like you have large bandwidth needs, you probably should set the channel width to 40MHz in the 5GHz band. Then 149 and 157 are perfectly fine, they won't overlap --- and you could set the third AP to 36 or 44 and it would also be fine, with no DFS hazard.
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@tgl said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
@terryzb said in How to debug iPhone WiFi calling degrading after ~10 minutes?:
The Airports are all set to Auto for channel. I've never changed them. I'm not clear on how you would like them assigned them. Can you describe what you mean for the 3 Airports and the 3 SSIDs?
You will only be able to change channels per-radio not per-SSID. There should be a single 2.4G channel setting per Airport. Unless you have near neighbors you want to avoid conflicting with, it doesn't matter which Airport you put on which channel --- just pick one for channel 1, one for channel 6, etc. Make sure the channel width is set to 20MHz, too (I forget whether the Airports ever offered the option of 40MHz, but you don't want to use that in the 2.4G band).
It looks like you already have the 5GHz channels spread apart a bit, but those could likely be tuned better as well. If you are using 80MHz channel width in 5GHz, then channels 149 and 157 actually overlap. That's better than having them be the very same channel, but it's not great. I'm surprised that nothing in the 36-48 channel range is being used: 36-48 and 149-161 are the normal 5GHz options in the US. The reason 60 is not in that set is that it's in the "DFS" spectrum where the AP is required to listen for radar pulses and shut itself down if it hears one. If you are in the boonies this isn't such a problem, but if you are near a major airport or weather radar station those channels can be pretty unusable. (I'm wondering now if this could have anything to do with your experience of 5GHz being unreliable. It is fine for most people.)
Actually, given that it doesn't sound like you have large bandwidth needs, you probably should set the channel width to 40MHz in the 5GHz band. Then 149 and 157 are perfectly fine, they won't overlap --- and you could set the third AP to 36 or 44 and it would also be fine, with no DFS hazard.
So the Extreme and the Express (with the wired backhaul) list channels 1-11 as choices for the 2.4GHz radio and 36, 44, 48, 149, 153, 157 and 161 for the 5GHz radio. The Express in the garage that is extended via WiFi does not allow for any channel selection. There is no option for channel width, but it looks pre-determined based on the distance between channel options. I will run the WiFI scan again when I get home and pay attention to what channels my neighbors are on.
Thank you very much for your help @tgl
