Help with internet sharing

SatanNick · January 9, 2022

Hi all. I've been watching LTT for years, but this is the first time I've ever checked out the forum. I did a little search, but came up with nothing useful.

My current home internet is ADSL at 15mbps down 1mbps up. My phone through 5G has150mps down 35mbps up and no data cap. I don't have an option to increase the speed of my ADSL connection through my ISP. Most of the time it is fast enough for YouTube videos and such, but it will chug with 4K or while gaming.

I'd like to be able to use my phone's data connection network wide, but only when I need the extra bandwidth. It's a Samsung S21 Ultra if that matters. Is there a way I can tell my phone to send it's connection back to the router (tp-link Deco x20 Mesh) instead of receiving it's connection from it? I know I could enable hotspot mode on my phone, but it's range is limited and I'd have to manually change the network on whatever devices I needed.

My other option is using usb network tethering on my laptop and then sending the connection back to the router from it's higher powered wireless NIC. Again, I know there's a hotspot mode in Windows 10, but I'd have to change all my devices over to it manually.

My 3rd option I can't test, as I don't have the proper hardware and don't want to buy it if it doesn't work. Can I get a usbC to Ethernet adapter, and plug my phone directly into the router instead of the ADSL modem and have it work? The adapters aren't that expensive, but I hate buying one if it's not going to work as I intend it to. Also I'd prefer a wireless option so that my phone isn't physically tethered to my router.

Does anything I'm saying make sense, and if it does, is it possible?

Thanks for any info you can provide for this noob.

P.S. LTTStore.com

Alex Atkin UK · January 10, 2022

18 hours ago, SatanNick said:

Does anything I'm saying make sense, and if it does, is it possible?

Theoretically yes, but I doubt your router supports it.

You'd need a router that can connect to your phones hotspot then use that as the WAN connection. It can be done on routers that allow third-party firmware like OpenWRT but I'm not aware of any that can do it out of the box.

I do not believe phones let you enable Internet sharing over an ethernet adapter so no, I don't think that method can work.

Some routers WILL work with USB tethering on phones though, so might be worth looking at, but probably not if its an ISP supplied router.