You can see who's connected to your Wi-Fi in the router's admin page under Connected Devices (sometimes Clients, DHCP, or Network Map), in the router manufacturer's phone app, or with a network scanner app on your phone.
The list shows each device's name, its address on the network, and its MAC address. An unfamiliar device isn't always a neighbor: more often it's a forgotten gadget, an old phone, or the TV. But if there really is a stranger, changing the password and closing the hole takes ten minutes.
router admin page most accurate
manufacturer app most convenient
scanner on phone fastest
└─ match by MAC and by nameMethod 1: see connected devices in the router admin page
- In a browser, open your router's address: usually 192.168.0.1 or 192.168.1.1 (it's printed on the sticker underneath).
- Sign in with the admin password. If it's still the factory default, change it now; that is a separate hole.
- Find Connected Devices, Clients, DHCP Client List, or Network Map, depending on what your router calls it.
- You get a list: hostname, IP, MAC, sometimes device type and connection time.
router admin page most complete manufacturer app easier, shorter phone scanner only what answers
Method 2: your router maker's app
TP-Link Tether, ASUS Router, Netgear Nighthawk, Google Home for Nest Wi-Fi, eero, Xiaomi Home: most have an app with the client list on the first screen and a one-tap block button.
Method 3: a Wi-Fi scanner app on your phone
Apps like Fing show every device on the network and guess the manufacturer from the MAC address (the hardware serial of a network card). Handy when the admin page is a pain to reach, but a scanner only sees what answers at the moment of the scan.
device name sometimes tells you
MAC address randomised on new
phones
connection time the useful column
└─ identify yours by switching
them off one at a timeHow to spot an unknown device
Go through the list and match it against what you own: phones, laptops, TV, console, speakers, vacuum, bulbs, cameras, printer, watch, e-reader. The manufacturer from the MAC helps: Apple, Samsung, Amazon, TP-Link. Signs of a stranger: an unfamiliar manufacturer, a device that appears at particular hours, a name like "android-..." when nobody at home has an Android phone.
One thing to know: modern phones make up a random MAC address per network, so one of your own devices can show up under several. Don't panic at duplicate Apple or Samsung entries.
sees your smart home devices can reach a NAS or a camera uses your bandwidth acts from your address
smart devices report no name phones randomise their MAC one device can appear twice └─ identify by switching things off, not by reading names
Why a stranger on your network matters
- They use your bandwidth and, on some plans, your data.
- They can see the devices on your network and try passwords on the printer, NAS or camera.
- Everything they do online comes from your IP address; to your ISP and to websites, it's you. What an address reveals is in what can someone do with my IP address.
- If your admin password is still the factory default, they can walk into the router and change things, like swapping your DNS.
How to kick someone off your Wi-Fi
- Change the Wi-Fi password. Every device disconnects; the stranger can't return without the new one. Use a long phrase from the password generator.
- Turn on WPA3 or WPA2-AES and kill WPS. WPS is very likely how they got in without your password.
- Block the stranger's MAC in the admin page if your router can. It won't stop someone determined, but it handles the neighbor helping themselves.
- Change the admin password if it was the default.
- A guest network for guests and smart devices, with client isolation, so even someone who connects can't see your computers.
- Update the firmware (the software inside your router): router bugs are another way in.
The full router checklist is in how to secure your home Wi-Fi router.
1 change the Wi-Fi password 2 change the admin password 3 disable WPS 4 update the firmware 5 move guests to the guest network
If there are no strangers but the internet is slow
Clean list, slow network: look for a cause, not a neighbor. A crowded 2.4 GHz band, a router behind a wall, old firmware, or one of your own devices downloading updates. Many routers show per-client usage in the admin page.
A device list from a router admin page reads badly. Hand it over.
Help me read the device list from my router.
Here is what it shows:
(paste the list: device names, connection times,
connection type)
My own devices: (list what you own: phones,
laptops, TV, speakers, bulbs).
Say which rows most likely match my devices and
which are unexplained and worth checking.
Do not repeat MAC addresses back to me.
Remember that new phones randomise their MAC and
that a device name can mean nothing.What the router can't fix
Even in a perfectly private home network, the ISP sees the site names and DNS queries of every device. Closing that requires a VPN, on each device or on the router; the breakdown is in what can my ISP see.
404 VPN runs on VLESS + Reality with a kill switch; the builds you can download today are Android and macOS, with the other platforms still in progress. That doesn't cover the whole house from one connection. A tunnel on the router does. What is ready is listed on the download page.
