Changing router

I am about to change my router. If I set the SSID and password the same on the new one will my devices automatically connect?

Possibly. I have done it a number of times - I think most times it has been seamless but sometimes I have had to reconnect all of my devices. Never really bothered trying to find out why sometimes it is fine and others it requires reconnecting.

In reply to a post by ponyman:

I am about to change my router. If I set the SSID and password the same on the new one will my devices automatically connect?

Depends on your devices, phones, tablets, laptops and even most printers will, but some smart home stuff won't, well not without a bit of mucking around. It is still easier to keep your old SDIS and password.

If you keep the security settings same, i,e. WPA2 etc. as well as the SSID and password, I don't see any reason why it shouldn't work.

I've had the same SSID and password for many years, and it's always connected as expected despite changing router in between (i.e. to upgrade).

I once had an issue, when I tried to keep same SSID and password, but did WPA3 instead, but swiftly moving it to WPA2 had everything connecting again.

In reply to a post by ian72:

Possibly. I have done it a number of times - I think most times it has been seamless but sometimes I have had to reconnect all of my devices. Never really bothered trying to find out why sometimes it is fine and others it requires reconnecting.

Some devices detect the 'new' router has a different MAC address I think. However in my experience the vast majority of devices are fooled.

In reply to a post by broadbandjockey:

In reply to a post by ian72:

Possibly. I have done it a number of times - I think most times it has been seamless but sometimes I have had to reconnect all of my devices. Never really bothered trying to find out why sometimes it is fine and others it requires reconnecting.

Some devices detect the 'new' router has a different MAC address I think. However in my experience the vast majority of devices are fooled.

It's not really being "fooled": if clients follow the specs, they *should* be able to roam seamlessly between different access points announcing the same ESSID.

It seems that in a few cases, the device decides to stick to the same MAC address (BSSID) that it originally saw. The reasons for this are unclear - possibly just a bug.