Review: 3 MiFi

The dream of universal wi-fi coverage wherever you travel didn’t quite happen. If you want to use wi-fi while you are on the road you’ll still find yourself tracking down hotspots in nearby cafes in order to get access. MiFi, from the 3 network, offers a better solution, a kind of compromise between the two scenarios. MiFi is a small wireless device with an embedded 3 Sim.

The device maintains a permanent connection to 3’s high-speed data network and functions as a wi-fi router. Simply connect your smartphone or netbook, in exactly the same way you would connect it to a router at home or in the office, and you have wi-fi access on your mobile device.

Now, of course, this doesn’t come for free, and you’ll need to pay for a separate contract for your data. A rolling one-month contract is charged at £15 for up to 5GB data, or you can buy the whole thing for £99.99 with 3GB of data included in the price. Thereafter you can simply top it up at pay as you go rates.

Up to five devices can connect to MiFi at the same time. The speeds you will get do depend on the coverage in your location – and so may vary significantly if you are sat on a train, for example – but with good HSDPA coverage you will be able to use bandwidth-heavy services such as BBC iPlayer or Spotify effectively, while still accessing web documents or emails as you would hope to do over a regular wi-fi connection.

Battery life is rated at five hours; our tests came up not far short of that mark.

MiFi is best seen as a natural next step on from the mobile broadband dongles that have proven popular over the last few years. By working independently of a notebook (and operating system) it is far more convenient if you wish to share your connection, and even though it is somewhat larger than a dongle it is an altogether more stylish piece of kit as well.

Convenient and well priced, MiFi is an ingenious system for road warriors.

Price: £69.99
Web: www.three.co.uk

Verdict: 9/10

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