Apple officially discontinues AirPort router product line, available while supplies last

Appleinsider ^ | April 26, 2018 | By Mikey Campbell

[Swordmaker]

Apple on Thursday announced the official death of its long-running AirPort Wi-Fi router line, a development many believed to be an inevitability after division responsible for its development was axed more than a year ago.

Apple confirmed the demise of its base station lineup in an email to AppleInsider, saying existing stock will be sold through the company's online and brick-and-mortar stores, as well as authorized resellers, until supplies are exhausted.

News of the discontinuation comes more than a year after reports claimed Apple broke its AirPort division apart, a sign that it planned to soon ditch the branded wireless hardware. At the time, employees working on AirPort development were supposedly reshuffled to other areas and projects within Apple, including Apple TV.

"The original AirPort wasn't really ours, we bought that," a person familiar with the situation told AppleInsider. "[Apple] supported that for a very long time, even after we built our own, re-organized the division, and some of the guys we brought on to advance the platform were twice-removed."

For many, AirPort's death comes as no surprise.

The last major upgrades arrived some five years ago when the AirPort Extreme and Time Capsule models received an aesthetic makeover and 802.11ac support. Apple touted a new "mini tower" design with a beamforming antenna array to aid in long-distance transmission. Apple's AirPort Express was last updated in 2012 with a design revamp and dual-band 802.11n compatibility. The portable Wi-Fi router never received 802.11ac treatment.

During the interim, Apple pushed out the rare software update to keep the routers free of bugs and major vulnerabilities. In 2016, for example, the company issued new firmware to fix a Back to My Mac compatibility issue. Most recently, Apple patched a critical "KRACK Attack" exploit late last year.

AirPort was introduced in 1999 and became a hardware mainstay for nearly twenty years, though its evolution often lagged behind partner Mac devices that routinely integrate cutting edge of Wi-Fi technology.

Apple dropped a hint that AirPort was not long for this world in January, when the Linksys Velop series became the first third-party router to be sold through Apple's online and physical stores.

[Swordmaker]

Apple officially pulls the WIFI plug on the AirPort line of Routers. Available only while supplies last, but I would not recommend purchasing such a critical piece of networking hardware when they are obviously deprecated by Apple. They won't get security updates. Right now the NetGear would probably be a better choice.—PING!

Apple Kills AirPort Router Line Ping!

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[House Atreides]

My poor old trusty Airport Time Capsule still sits chugging away on its wall mount doing its job year after year. It never seems to die or have any hiccups. Hell, it might outlive me.

[minnesota_bound]

Apple will soon announce they are giving up the Apple OS and switching to Windows 10. : )

[PA Engineer]

Shame. I just bought one to add to my original time capsule. Seamless integration, with a network boost around the house. I think this is a mistake.

[donozark]

Have used mine for several years now. Works great.

[reed13k]

I might have to go buy one as a backup in case my current one goes out.

[Menehune56]

May I ask if there’s a NetGear box you recommend?

[Flick Lives]

I might have to go buy one as a backup in case my current one goes out.

—

I’m thinking the same. I love the Time Capsule. It’s simple, does its job, and you don’t even know it’s there.

[US_MilitaryRules]

ORBI

[Flick Lives]

Always kind of liked the original Apple Airport WiFi router that looked a bit like a little UFO.

[TXnMA]

My time capsule always ran hot -- even with fans on it. then, the HD stopped spinning... :-(

My Airport express still serves well as a printer router -- since I dumped my satellite ISP and went to a cellular ISP that provides its own wi-fi hotspot.

Even when located in the house, the hotspot barely covers the 70' dimension of our house.

But , my granddaughter swears that she was sitting in the back seat, still surfing on the Airport -- when we were over two miles from home!

TXnMA
 

[House Atreides]

Jeez, that looks like if you tried to throw it away it would boomerang back. ;-)

[roadcat]

Say it isn't so... sigh, my Apple Airport routers have worked flawlessly for years. I have one with an internal HD for Time Capsule backups of all my computers on my LAN, and it has an external HD with hundreds of movies and content for streaming to my computers. Works great. Another one serves as an extension of the LAN in the house.

I've used other routers like Linksys and Netgear and had lots of problems with those before replacing them all with Airport routers which never have problems. Darn!

[Gator113]

I am on my second one and it is now acting up. I think the first one lasted about 5 years and this one is about 3 years old. Would you like to trade 2 for 1? ;>)

[Crusher138]

Well, that just sucks.

I really like the way my AirPort just seamlessly connects with everything. We got ours 3 years ago.

[Swordmaker]

May I ask if there’s a NetGear box you recommend?

Any of them are good. Depends on your needs. For example, do you need any wired connectivity through Ethernet, then you need to get one with that and then one with sufficient ports. You want at least one that does dual band and Gigabit Ethernet. The Netgear R6700 is on Amazon for $99 and should meet most home needs. If you have a house with a large foot print or multiple stories, you'd likely want to get a WIFI extender as well.

[Menehune56]

Thank you Swordmaker. I’m hoping my 2-TB Time Capsule from 2012 keeps ticking along and I won’t have to worry about it any time soon. If it does fail, I’ll probably just get a big honking hard disk for Time Machine backup and use the U-verse gateway for Wi-Fi.