Routers, access points, and network-attached storage (NAS) devices—or, as they’re typically called at the office, servers—are beyond essential in the workplace. The benefits of a network at the office include increased productivity, efficiency, and customer service satisfaction. But finding brands you can rely on isn’t always easy. That goes for both home offices and big enterprises.
“You can’t use any old consumer router for your office internet needs,” says Tom Brant, PCMag deputy managing editor for reviews of networking products. “Business-class networking products have the capabilities that you need to tailor your Wi-Fi access point layout to your physical space and monitor network health once the install is complete, among many other critical features.”
We turned to you, home workers and IT managers alike, to find the brands you prefer and recommend the most. They’re the Business Choice award winners in networking equipment for 2025.
If you’re more interested in network tech for non-business purposes, check out our Readers’ Choice Awards for routers, modems, and NAS devices.
The Top Networking Brands for Home Offices 2025
Asus won the Business Choice award seven times between 2014 and 2021, then dropped off for three years. But now, Asus is back on top when it comes to routers used by the work-from-home crowd. This year, its results are stellar: Asus’s home office routers have an overall satisfaction rating of 9.4 out of 10, well ahead of any numbers it had in the past. (Its previous max was an 8.7, a whole decade ago.)
(Note: Click the arrows in our interactive charts to view various elements of our survey results.)
Asus also wins the award for mesh networking for home offices. Its mesh coverage rating (in the chart above) is even higher than its overall satisfaction marks. Most of its numbers are pretty high, with the exception of a 7.9 for value, where it trails TP-Link. Asus isn’t afraid to charge people for quality; the tri-band Asus RT-BE96U with Wi-Fi 7, for example, has an MSRP of $699.99.
“While the RT-BE96U is expensive, you get a lot of value out of it,” Brant says. “That includes a pair of 10GbE networking ports, high-speed USB connectivity, free parental-control software, and, most importantly, fast throughput performance.”
Several survey respondents praise Asus for simplifying the process of activating a virtual private network that protects everything connected. “It’s really easy to set up a VPN connection on the router for full coverage of all devices,” says one.
TP-Link’s satisfaction score, which led to its win here last year, dropped. We presume that’s reflective of the allegations that the company’s products represent security concerns.
What about storing your files in a home or small business office? For peace of mind when it comes to backups and sharing files or media, these workplaces should turn to NAS devices. As has been true every year we’ve done this survey, Synology is the top-rated brand for network storage. This marks Synology’s 11th Business Choice win for storage by home or SMBs.
There’s a chance of change next year, however. Rival QNAP is only a tenth of a point behind Synology this year in terms of satisfaction, and has even higher scores than Synology in some sub-categories, including extra-high numbers for media and file storage and access. Most importantly, QNAP wins for reliability.
Readers find Synology the most satisfying brand for their home offices and still recommend it the most. (Note: Self-built NAS devices actually outrank Synology in terms of satisfaction.) However, the drops in its scores since last year might be the result of the company’s recent requirement to use its own brand of drives in newer NAS devices. More on that below.
“For the last few years, our top recommendation for a five-bay NAS has been the Synology DiskStation DS1522+,” Brant says. “For many businesses, scalability is the name of the game when it comes to network storage, and the DS1522+ delivers that in spades.”
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To see which routers and NAS devices currently lead in our lab testing, read The Best Wi-Fi Routers We’ve Tested and The Best NAS (Network Attached Storage) Devices for 2025.
The Top IT-Managed Networking Brands for 2025
This is our third year surveying IT-managed networking brands. In 2023, Ubiquiti was the top router brand in the office, while Fortinet took the trophy in 2024. But Ubiquiti returns this year with better satisfaction ratings than ever. Fortinet fell to the bottom of the chart, behind both Ubiquiti and Cisco.
Ubiquiti leads in every measure in which it has a score, mostly with figures above 9.0. Its lowest rating is 8.6 for cost, yet that’s still the top grade in that category.
Cisco also tops Fortinet, putting the former in the dead middle of the chart, but with a very good score for overall satisfaction. Just not as good as Ubiquiti’s.
Recommended by Our Editors
Ubiquiti users praise the company for not requiring the purchase of annual support packages, with one calling that move “an industry game changer.” In a dig at Cisco, another says, “Who wants to pay yearly subscription fees just to use your Wi-Fi?”
“Ubiquiti is continually updating the software for their devices,” says a third reader. “It does a great job of leading the drive on networking infrastructure.”
In a big enterprise or large workplace, access points (APs) go hand-in-hand with the router—they’re the devices that deliver the Wi-Fi signals to users. When it comes to access points, Ubiquiti, which makes APs branded as UniFi, takes the prize for the third year in a row.
The only specs that Ubiquiti APs don’t come out on top of are tech support, which goes to Meraki, and for the Wi-Fi connection quality, which is all Cisco. (Cisco actually owns Meraki.) Ubiquiti is the best-rated brand (or tied for first) in every other metric, with particularly respectable scores for setup, reliability, and Wi-Fi speed—the ones that matter most, whether you’re in IT or a user.
“The ease of setup and analytics are great,” says an IT-managing survey taker about Ubiquiti’s UniFi-branded APs. “You have so much control over the network without additional cost. Support may not be instant, but they are same-day and pretty good at resolving issues. Much lower cost of ownership than Meraki. Will never buy Cisco products again now that I have started using Ubiquiti.”
Finally, we reach the servers, the digital boxes storing all the precious data a business needs to access both internally and externally. Synology also makes big-scale enterprise servers and proves its bona fides with another win—its third Business Choice award for IT servers.
It’s up against venerable names. Dell and HP had servers in offices long before Synology was founded in Taiwan in 2000. The scores are close—Dell is just a bit behind Synology for overall satisfaction, much closer than last year, and ties it for likelihood to recommend—but Synology scores highest for reliability and performance, key factors for any IT setup.
“We almost never contact support for these at client sites,” one respondent says of Synology servers. “They are rock-solid.” Still, complaints that the company now forces new buyers to also use Synology-branded drives came up: “The only thing I don’t like about this NAS is they require you to purchase specific hard drives in order for support to be able to help you. That being said, I haven’t had a need to call them. It just works.”
Full Results
The PCMag Business Choice survey for Home Networking Equipment was in the field from March 11 to June 2, 2025. For more information on how we conduct surveys, read our methodology.
PCMag Readers’ Choice: How Our Surveys Help You Find the Best Products
About Eric Griffith
Senior Editor, Features
