What should I do if my Xiaomi router overheats and cuts off power? In summer, when it was hot to the touch and videos were lagging, I went from covering cardboard to completely solving it, but I took a detour along the way

last year, during the dog days of summer, my Xiaomi AX3000T started throwing a tantrum: nothing happened during the day, but at seven or eight in the evening, the TV would lag when casting, my phone would scroll videos in circles, and after a couple of games, latency would jump from 30ms to over 200 milliseconds. At first, I thought it was a broadband issue. I called the operator, and the technician remotely tested the line and said everything was normal. It wasn't until one day I went to restart the router and touched the body— hot, the kind of you could clearly feel the temperature—that I realized I was heading in the wrong direction.

searching online, Xiaomi routers heating up is not an isolated case. The AX3000T, AX6000, and Redmi AX6S have all been mentioned in the comment sections, especially in summer when indoor temperatures reach 30°C, where they feel almost hot to the touch. This article describes my entire process of checking and resolving issues. If you encounter detours along the way, if you encounter 'good during the day but stuck at night' or 'flow stops as soon as summer,' you can follow these guidelines.

clarify first: what level of fever counts as abnormal

routers are devices powered on year-round, so a slight temperature is normal—don't panic when you touch them. My judgment is a bit straightforward: if you can pause for three to five seconds when the back of your hand is pressed against it, that's considered normal warmth; If you want to pull your hand back at the first touch, or if you can smell a slight smell of plastic heating on the top, that's an overheating .

more reliable way to verify is to see if "temperature" and "flow interruption" occur simultaneously. I couldn't find the temperature display in the AX3000T backend (192.168.31.1 → Advanced Settings → System Status, which varies slightly by firmware path), so I used the dumbest comparison method: blowing a fan on the router overnight significantly reduced the lag; Once the fan stopped, the next night I would still play the card as usual. This basically locks in the issue of temperature, not channel interference or broadband itself. How to troubleshoot channel interference? I previously wrote an article WiFi self-check methods for channel interference. If the fan is also stuck, you should check that article first.

Why does overheating cause the flow to stop? Router chips, like phone processors, will throttle if the temperature exceeds the standard. When WiFi chips throttle down, transmission power and data processing power drop, resulting in signal reaching full bars but poor speed. If the time drags on, devices may frequently disconnect and reconnect.

the detour I took: a piece of cardboard almost made a bad mistake

my first reaction after discovering overheating was very amateurish—I found a piece of cardboard to cover the router, thinking about "physical cooling." But it backfired—after covering it, the heat couldn't escape, making it even more stuck that night. the core of cooling is to let heat flow out, not to block heat waves from hitting . If you go against this direction, all the effort is wasted.

there's also a reverse approach that doesn't work: some people stuff routers into low-voltage boxes to "out of sight" or stack them on optical modems or set-top boxes to save space. The weak current box is a sealed metal box, with temperatures of forty to fifty degrees inside in summer. The router inside is like a sauna; Stacking means the two machines above and below heat each other. I previously wrote a practical test router placement, specifically measuring the signal difference between weak current boxes and stacked units. The conclusion was to avoid placing them in either area as much as possible.

Second, lower the transmission power threshold (if your firmware includes this option). The power setting has been changed from "Wall Penetration Mode" to "Standard," which significantly reduces heat generation. My house isn't big, and the standard signal is more than enough; But if your home is large and you rely on this device to support everything, then don't lower the price. If you need Mesh, go Mesh. I've written an article about Xiaomi's Mesh networking the entire networking process, which is much more scientific than relying solely on a single device.

by the way, a scheduled restart. Although restarting doesn't cure heating, machines that don't restart for a long time use high memory and heavy load, which also worsen heating. I set the scheduled restart to 4 a.m. every Wednesday. I wrote in detail in this article the Xiaomi router scheduled restart settings , so I won't repeat it here.

Mijia has many smart devices, there are other odd things

here, I need to discuss a specific situation: if your home has many Mijia smart devices (cameras, speakers, lights, sensors totaling twenty or thirty or more), router lag may not be entirely due to heating. Many Mi Home devices run on 2.4GHz, and many devices frequently disconnect and reconnect to WiFi to save power. The router's connection meter is packed to the brim, showing signs of "lag, slowness, and disconnection."

method to distinguish is still the same comparison: after a fan runs all night, → improvement is mainly due to heat; Even after the issue, it still lags, especially when no one is using the internet in the early hours→ most likely due to device connection count. The latter solution is to set 2.4G and 5G separately (don't use dual-band integration), so all smart devices are connected to 2.4G, while phones and computers run 5G, so neither side competes. AX3000T supports dual-band separation; just turn off "Dual-band integration" in the Mi Home app or WiFi settings in the background.

which situations indicate hardware aging, don't force it

to be honest, not all heating and flow interruptions can save you. My Redmi AC2100, bought in 2019, has been used for five years. Despite all the cooling measures, it still frequently drops out. When I opened it up, the capacitors inside were all bulging—this means the hardware has reached its end in life, and no matter how well the cooling is done, it's just a last flash. machine has been used for over five years, been scalding for three or four years, and recently suddenly deteriorated, don't bother with it—just replace it with a new one. .

when replacing the case, pay attention to two points: first, choose models with metal casings or more ventilation holes, as passive heat dissipation is naturally better than fully enclosed plastic cases; Second, don't blindly believe in "signal through walls"—the higher the power, the more heat generated—just enough is enough. Right now, I AX3000T to put it upright and add a USB fan, which stays stable all summer. In total, I spent 22 yuan, which is much more cost-effective than replacing the device.

to summarize the order: first check if it's overheating (fan comparison method), then set up a vertical ventilation system away from heat sources (free), if not, add a fan (about twenty yuan), conveniently disable redundant functions, separate dual-frequency functions, and replace machines over five years old. Following this order, most summer issues of heat loss and flow interruption can be suppressed.