Audio cutting out on Android Wi-Fi calls (EE Smart Hub Pro)

[ow259]

Evening All

My household seems to be running into a requent problem with audio calls. 

If you are using an android device and you make a Wifi Call, whatsapp, viber, etc, the other persons audio will cut out every few words making it impossible to actually speak to someone on the phone cause you miss a chunk of a sentence. 

This has been a thing for months, since January for one person. This was on samsungs last version of OneUI. Since this new version, other family members have reported the same thing. 

I am the only iPhone user in the house and I do not have any problems at all with audio calls like the above. 

This is NOT an issue on mobile data (unusable where I live) or other peoples home networks. I dont have a third party router to test. 

Im not inclined to point the finger at Samsung or Google (android) since this ONLY happens on my network and not on data or other networks. 

I have called EE Technical Support and was told that this is the first the agent had heard of this and that another technical team with more backend access will take a look and if he hears back he'll let me know. I dont imagine this would be any logs though. 

Does anyone else have this issue at all? 

Hub: EE Smart Hub Pro (Wifi 7)

Firmware: r2.64.7-R-1303938-PROD-1

[bristolian]

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@ow259 wrote:

The other persons audio will cut out every few words making it impossible to actually speak to someone on the phone cause you miss a chunk of a sentence. 

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For starters you need to differentiate between WiFi-calling & app-based calls - they are fundamentally different.

Apps are entirely internet-based. Usage of them is handled by both your phone & the mobile network as data usage, and any issues with them are usually the responsibility of the app developer.

WiFi-calling is fundamentally different, where you are merely replacing the radio access network with an internet-link, but otherwise using EE's core network for routing in the exact same way as if you were using the mobile network.

Momentary audio dropouts can often be due to a call being handed between VoWiFi & VoLTE/VoNR - in other words, the phone is swapping between WiFi as the radio layer, and mobile as the radio layer... all whilst remaining on the same core network. This is not a OneUI issue.

[SL1973]

So there isn't a solution then? I was with Sky broadband previously and never had an issue with drop outs until I moved to  EE (using same phone - Samsung Galaxy S23).

I have exactly the same problem as ow259. There's no issue with my wife and daughter using their iPhones.

[JamesGunatilake]

Hi there,

I had a very similar issue in my household and recently managed to fix it, so I thought I’d share what worked for me.

We were experiencing frequent problems with audio dropping out on Wi-Fi calls (WhatsApp, Viber, Wi-Fi Calling) on multiple Android devices — mainly Samsung phones. The audio would cut every few seconds, making conversations very difficult. Interestingly, the iPhone in the house had no issues at all.

After a lot of testing, I ruled out signal strength and packet loss. The internet was stable and fast, and the signal strength on Wi-Fi was excellent. The issue only occurred on our home Wi-Fi — not on mobile data or when connected to other networks.

Here’s what fixed it for us:

1. Split the 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi bands
   The EE Smart Hub Pro combines both bands under one name by default. I logged into the router admin page at 192.168.1.254, created a separate SSID for the 5GHz band (e.g., "EE-Home-5G"), and then connected all Android devices to that 5GHz network. Once we did this, the call quality issues were completely resolved.

2. (Optional) Reset network settings or update the phone OS
   This can help too, but isolating Android devices on 5GHz made the biggest difference for us.

So it’s not a Samsung or Android problem — it’s more likely due to how the EE router handles 2.4GHz traffic, especially for real-time VoIP apps.

Hope this helps!

James

[SL1973]

Thanks James for the quick and helpful response! I'll give that a go!

Steve

Sent from my Galaxy

[ow259]

I have also found that when i connect android devices to the compatability SSID (enabled in admin panel), the calls stop cutting out and work as expected. Should really not be a problem to begin with for highly priced cost. 

I was also on sky where this wasnt an issue. I dont have another router to be able to test with but i feel like this wouldnt be an issue with a 3rd party one. When one problem ends another begins with this hub.

Not sure why the above was marked as solution when it isnt...

[JamesGunatilake]

Thanks for sharing — I totally get your frustration. I had the exact same issue with Android devices cutting out on WhatsApp and Wi-Fi calls on the EE Smart Hub Pro. Honestly, it was a nightmare — I make 8–10 calls a day for work and family, and the constant audio dropouts made it unusable.

After a lot of trial and error, I found a fix that completely solved it for me:

✅ What worked:

Logged into the router at 192.168.1.254

Split the Wi-Fi bands by creating separate SSIDs for 2.4GHz and 5GHz (e.g., EE-Home and EE-Home-5G)

Connected all Android devices only to the 5GHz SSID

Since doing that, calls are crystal clear — no jitter, no latency, no packet loss, and no cutouts. Everything works exactly as it should.

You're absolutely right — this shouldn't be happening on a high-end router like this. I also came from Sky and never had these problems. I agree that it likely wouldn’t be an issue with a third-party router either.

The fact that the compatibility SSID also works suggests that EE’s Smart Hub has problems managing Android traffic on 2.4GHz — but splitting the bands gives you proper control and stability.

Happy to help if you want step-by-step instructions.

James