Opal (GL-SFT1200) Cost-Effective Pocket Router

The Bottom Line: If you travel internationally or just hate annoying hotel login pages, this tiny box is a must-have. It’s small, fast, and makes public networks actually secure. Why it’s a travel essential: International Reliable: I’ve used this across France and Wales with zero connectivity issues. It handles different network types like a pro. VPN Champ: The standout feature. I set it up to tunnel back to my home network—perfect for keeping my data private and accessing my home streaming services while abroad. Pocket-Sized: It’s barely larger than a pack of cards. It fits in my tech pouch without a second thought. USB-C Powered: I’ve even run it off a power bank when a wall socket wasn't handy. The Real-World Experience: The setup is intuitive. Instead of connecting five different devices to a new Wi-Fi every time I move locations, I just connect the Opal to the local network, and all my gear stays connected to the router. It saves so much time. The Verdict: A game-changer for digital nomads or anyone visiting family abroad. It’s significantly more stable and secure than using a phone hotspot.

Extremely easy to setup even for a novice. The range is excellent. I managed to connect to it anywhere in our large home. It works nicely with Proton VPN and Nord VPN too. Super easy to use. Very easy to create a WireGuard VPN Client. Just connect to the Router Admin page (192.168.8.1/Admin). Download a configuration file for a router from Proton VPN (which is totally free of charge), upload it to the GL-SFT1200 (I recommend you use WireGuard rather than OpenVPN). Setup this little custom physical button on the side to use VPN when on and your local wifi connection when off. That is it. Great value and highly recommended.

I would describe this device as a “pocket rocket.” Despite its small size, it offers an impressive range of functionalities at a very reasonable price. The router is highly portable, making it perfect for travel, while also capable of serving as a full-featured VPN server at home. Design & Portability: The router is compact and fits comfortably in the hand, making it easy to carry when traveling. Its low power consumption means it can be powered via a power bank, laptop USB port, or standard phone charger, adding to its convenience on the go. Wifi 6 gives excellent wifi signal strength offering both 5 & 2.4 options. VPN Capabilities: This router supports both OpenVPN and WireGuard VPN, allowing for secure connections from anywhere. One of the standout features is that it does not require a static IP to run a VPN server. The router detects your IP automatically and integrates seamlessly with the cloud services it provides, simplifying setup. Client configurations are easy to download and configure on multiple devices. Use Case & Performance: I use two of these routers: • At home, as a WireGuard VPN server. • While traveling, as a client connecting to my home VPN server. When abroad, I simply connect the portable router to the hotel or public Wi-Fi network, and it automatically secures all my devices through the VPN. This setup provides a hassle-free, secure Internet experience on the go. Remote Management & Interface: The router’s interface is intuitive and straightforward, offering a wide range of features. You can access and modify the router remotely from anywhere in the world, allowing for easy management of VPN settings and other configurations. Support & Resources: The support page is comprehensive, providing all the information needed to maximize the router’s capabilities. I found it extremely helpful for both setup and troubleshooting. Conclusion: For the price, this router is exceptional. It’s perfect for travelers who want a portable, secure VPN solution or for anyone needing a local VPN server at home. I am very satisfied with my purchase and highly recommend it.

The setup on this was very simple. I tried configuring on old router with openwrt to act as a wifi repeater but found information online was either out of date or not quite what I wanted. This solved the configuration issue with it's simple web based interface. Tested speed against my one 150mb/s Internet and obtained 85mb/s using just wifi. Very happy with that. Seems well built and small enough of carry on travels. The cpu is slow using advanced settings with Luci ui, but that is to be expected at this price. Update: I tested this on my Sky 150mbs home router and the Opal crashed immediately when I tried to use a browser on phone or laptop. I then tried it when during a week at a holiday cottage where the Internet connection appeared to be a guest network running at 15mbs running from the cottage next door. The opal was rock solid all week for streaming, web browsing and video calls. Not sure why it crashes at home maybe the faster broadband or Sky router. It works for the purpose I purchased it for so I am happy.

I chose a travel router as most places we stay on holiday have wifi but I'm never very sure how secure it is and the wee unit is supposed to protect our holiday Internet use. At first I couldn't get my phone to link to the Opal no matter how I tried, but when I used my laptop to run the set up it all happened fairly quickly, so be patient and do the set up at home, not on holiday or in a place where you have no alternative devices to try and help you. Signal strength was excellent and I noticed that both my phone, after linking to the Opal's WiFi rather than my primary WiFi, and my laptop seemed much faster using and browsing pages. Its truly a small wonder, feels a solidly built unit, very portable and a very clever mains plug with UK and European adaptors that fit in seconds wherever your use. Once you are set up via the set up routine its like every other router except its tiny compared to office or even home wifi hubs. I used it with my Virgin hub at home to run the set up and play with it for an hour so it looks like it'll work with most wifi signals that you could meet in hotels or any public place producing a wifi signal that you'd like to use but aren't sure how secure it could be. The only thing you need to consider is that its mains powered so no battery use, but if most of your wifi use in a hotel, or villa/apartment, train, is inside the public wifi signal where you are, just find a plug for power, log in once to the public wifi and its log in routine, and then connect up to five devices to the Opal, no need to log in to the service's log in restrictions or limits. There's also 2 settings in the set up to create a VPN server or client using the Opal so if you want belt and braces security while you travel or work away from home, this wee bit of kit could fit the bill.

small and light little device. Setup is pretty easy. you have choices, 1. repeater (connect to you existing wifi), 2. Ethernet connect to you router (mine changed to modem), 3. tethering (connect to a hotspot) and 4. which can be use dwith a mdoem dongle and a sim. My main router is vergin media HUB 5 with 350Mbps. I switcged my HUB 5 to modem and connected the little guy to it via the wan port you can use the 2.5Gbps port (the red one, which i am doing). You can only use one port on the HUB as wan (Internet). 1. Lan port, I get the full speed and a little more. 2. at 2.4Ghz (set the band width to 40) and I get 150 Mbps. 3. at 5Ghz I get 250 Mbps. Bandwidth set to 80 I am about 10 metres away. (you might have to adjsust the antenna for your locations. direct them one of them towards you.) setting up the VPN servers is a breeze. If you have a dybamic IP address form you ISP (i.e not permanent, most are dynamic) then you need to set a switch for DDNS, you will be advised to do that, ortherwise vpn wont work as it can resolved your IP address. You can choose openvpn or wireguard. Wireguard is newer and faster. Then export the configuration file from the menu to your dvice. Download the client for your device, import the configuration file, and connect to the server. thats it (you need to do this for each device that you want it to use VPN). I testd this configurations from insiode the otudoors and works perfectly fine. You will lose some speed of course, thats normal. I haven't tested the other configurations. I bought this for the otudoor. I liked so much that I bought its big brother the AX1800 (on sale on their website, cheaper than amazon by £20. Just for the VPN servers, saving monthly subscriptions. One more thing, you need to open up port 1194 (you will advised so by the this router) I think on your modem/router. The receiver should be the IP address of the little guy. Also open it on the little guy. In repeater mode, the 5Ghz can poly use bandiwth 40. Loss of some speed. 2.Ghz is great. I you find that it is slower than expected, then check the wifi channel. Experiemnt by changing it. I resolved an issue where 5HZ default channel which was conflicting with my neighbour's. After changing it I got about 280 Mbps. Not bad for this little device. Well Recommended.

If you've not used GL-iNet routers you are missing out. I needed a value for money travel router with 5GHz Wifi that would connect to my 5G HotSpot (via WIFI 5GHz), provide easy VPN access via WireGuard to my home network, have gigabit ethernet ports and be powered by USB C. This router fulfilled all of those requirements :-) The initial setup is super easy. Power up the device, connect to it either by WIFI or one of the Gigabit ethernet ports and put the router IP into your browser. From there you have an extremely user friendly interface with all the options you could ever need. Just to summarise these, you can connect to another Wifi source for your internet, you can plug in an ethernet source or you can even tether from a USB source (whether your phone or a USB stick). Once connected to the internet you can configure your VPN. Here you have the choice of OpenVPN or WireGuard. As my home router has a WireGuard VPN server built in, I used that and immediately I was connected. The other nice touch with regards to this router and the VPN connection is the switch on the side of the unit. You can configure this for several options, one being VPN on or off - what a smart idea!!! You can of course configure the onboard firewall as well, opening ports, DMZ etc etc. For such a small device it's heavily loaded with relevant functionality. Due to the complexity of my home network I did run into an issue where I was routing the internet connection through to the VPN, but my local network resources were not reachable. I reached out to the GL-iNet support team and they responded very quickly with great support. After changing the routing mode of the VPN (to Customize Routing Rules) I was able to apply customised routing rules specifically for my home VLAN, and as a bonus, was also able to push internet traffic out locally from the connected WIFI source instead of going via my home network :-) The support I received was first class, and the engineer even went as far as giving me the reason why I needed to use the customised routing. This was due to an IP range clash I had somewhere along the way. If the router detects this it won't push traffic automatically down the VPN tunnel, to prevent potential IP clash issues. However, you can override this easily and this is what I ended up doing. It now works flawlessly. A Huge thanks again to GL-iNet support, it really was a pleasure communicating with you. I can honestly recommend these devices and this company, what a great end user experience !!

I originally bought these to act as network Extenders, replacing old Cat 5 cabling during a home network refresh after several decades! In princible, and from all that I read, these devices should fit the bill perfectly to allow Ethernet-only devices to connect using the Opal's Wi-Fi link to the home Eero mesh network. And they did ... for short distances and with no walls in place! They would also wander all over the mesh, connectiting to more distant nodes inexplicably, despite all attempts to lock these to a particular BSSID. I found after a lot of effort that flipping them into Extender mode rendered BSSID locking completely futile! Fine for Repeater but in Extender the LuCi config for BSSID is ignored. It took so long to work through everything, it would work for a day, or a few hours, then drift off again (pulsing blue light). I didn't keep an eye on the clock and missed the 30-day return period! So what are they good for? Well as long as you're using them in Repeater mode, all configured by the Opal's own User Interface then all will work well (assuming you're within Wi-Fi reach of course, and bear in mind these units are weak in that respect). We're taking one on holiday with us to use to mimic our home Wi-Fi for easy connectivity with the devices we take with us. They are very portable, requiring only a USB power source or using their own supplied PSU.

الراوتر ممتاز والشركة محترمة جدا طلبت فاتورة وتم ارسالها

Funziona molto bene ed è facile da installare. Ha molte modalità di utilizzo. Piccolo e comodo da portare in viaggio, lo uso ormai da mesi e non ho mai avuto problemi con nessun wifi.

This GL.iNet device works very well when used as a dedicated Wi‑Fi access point. It’s compact, fast, and perfect for situations where you want to plug into an existing Ethernet port and add strong, reliable wireless coverage without replacing your main router. Once running, performance and stability are excellent for the price. There is one setup quirk worth knowing: if you switch the unit into Access Point mode (the mode you’ll use if you’re connecting it to an Ethernet jack to act purely as a Wi‑Fi AP), it stops using the default 192.168.8.1 address and receives a new IP from your home network. You need that new IP to reopen the admin login page — but the device doesn’t show it to you. Fortunately, the workaround is simple: open a command prompt and enter arp -a. In the list that appears, look for the entry whose MAC address starts with 94:83:C4 — that’s the GL.iNet access point, and the IP next to it is the one you use to log back in.

Klockren liten router som passar fint i husbilen!

Excellent product