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• Meshtastic: “Is LongFast Holding Your Mesh Back? Better LoRa Presets for Bigger Meshtastic Networks”

During the summer of 2025, many operators decided to undertake an organized test of different radio presets. Concerned with some rogue routers and uncooperative nodes, as well as the growing density, it seemed sensible to explore non-default radio configurations, in effect reforming the mesh. Results were mixed, see below.

Current Preset Test

None.

Past Preset Tests

Test 4

• Start Date: 2025 December 8
• End Date: 2025 December 9
• Modem Preset: MediumSlow
• Frequency Slot: 52 (default)

• Outcome:

  Where it worked, it worked. Good links got very good due to the lack of congestion. Poor links became marginal or impossible due to the drop in link budget and inadequate packet-level redundancy. Overall the test confirmed a lot of the thinking about how a wide-area mesh can be effective, either through positive or negative outcomes.

  Participation was a bit limited, geographically: Jersey City, a scattering in Manhattan, some in Astoria and out to Corona, and a small handful in Brooklyn. Jersey City had pre-existing MediumSlow links, adding a few more with great success and connecting easily to Midtown. CmW2 also was able to link with P0NY in downtown Brooklyn. 25WA and P0NY provided solid relays for some, but Brooklyn infrastructure participation was otherwise nonexistent. Queens had good connections within its boundaries.

  The biggest impacts were from routers in Midtown, new to the mesh generally since the previous tests. They provided a lot of connectivity for most test participants. Unfortunately, they are unfiltered and suffer from poor sensitivity. High-powered or well situated nodes that previously could reach them when not congested had no trouble punching through the noise. Throughput increased due to the lack of collisions and shorter airtime. Remote admin was downright snappy. Text Message reached an 18% share of packets. However, quieter nodes trying to reach Penn experienced a clear -3 dB link budget penalty expected on paper, and the links became intermittent.

  A bit of a cliff between Manhattan and Astoria formed. Without alternate paths through Brooklyn, going from west to east was dependent on a couple of now-marginal links. Even trying new router(late)s was not enough to overcome the noise floor of the Midtown routers. Good range was clearly still possible: one of the farthest one-way links was 27 km from Midtown to North Haledon, NJ. A few packets even made it from Corona there. No packets came back.

  Takeaways:

  • a 3 dB reduction in link budget doesn’t seem like much, but it can be a critical difference for marginal connections
  • reduced congestion, due to airtime or fewer packets/users, makes the network flow well (obvious but nice to see in action)
  • filters are a must for high-placed nodes, regardless of the radio settings but especially with less link budget to work with
  • a mesh requires a critical mass to switch and provide redundant paths

Test 3

• Start Date: Summer 2025
• End Date: Summer 2025
• Modem Preset: LongFast
• Frequency Slot: 24
• Outcome: Best of the three tested over the summer of 2025 for many. Those farther out still were unable to stay connected due to lack of participation by uncooperative intermediate nodes. Being off the default frequency allowed the network to escape problematic nodes.

Test 2

• Start Date: Summer 2025
• End Date: Summer 2025
• Modem Preset: MediumSlow
• Frequency Slot: 52 (default)
• Outcome: Better than MediumFast but still inadequate linking all around.

Test 1

• Start Date: Summer 2025
• End Date: Summer 2025
• Modem Preset: MediumFast
• Frequency Slot: 45 (default)
• Outcome: Fell flat. Even with a fairly substantial participation rate, many links did not work.