Expanding AP325 wireless network when only AP330's are available

Verified

We have a client with a lot of AP325's throughout his facility. We put this network in back in 2018 and his current support subscriptions are good through 2024. The client wants to expand his existing wireless network by adding more AP's in new areas of the building.

The AP325 is end-of-sale already but end-of-life on December 21, 2026.

The AP330 is not compatible with the AP325 network because one if Wi-Fi 5 and the other is Wi-Fi 6.

My initial idea was to add several AP330's and just define the same SSID's on the AP330's, then devices will roam between the AP325's and AP330's, but WG Support says the different AP types won't play nicely with each other due to power detection differences between the 2 models.

Questions:

How do we expand his existing wireless network if we can't get AP325's anymore?

Has anyone tried mixing AP types like this and if so, how did it work out?

How have others dealt with this issue?

james.carson

Hi @Verified

The APs themselves can be assigned the same SSIDs via their respective management portals. Since they do not talk to each other, you may need to tweak power settings manually on APs. If you are using WIPS, you would also need to ensure that the MAC addresses of each AP are in the opposite portals respectively.

If you'd prefer to stick with AP325s, while WatchGuard is no longer selling these, other vendors may still have them in stock. It may be worth contacting whomever you purchased the previous APs via to see if they have any of that model in stock.

If you'd prefer to just move to AP330s, I would suggest sending an email or calling your WatchGuard Sales rep -- they can likely work out a trade-up where the time left on the old APs is pro-rated to the new ones so the customer doesn't have to drop any licensing.

The sales contact form/phone numbers are here:
https://www.watchguard.com/wgrd-sales/emailus