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Forum Discussion
Why No Circle for RBR750 or other Wifi6 Routers??
I've had my RBR750 for months now, and there still is no word on an implementation of the Circle app for it. It was an expensive router, and i thought it would come with that feature right out of the box when I bought it. I thought for sure it would come with parental control features, but it is worthless for any of those features without the Circle app.
Can anyone on the Netgear or Circle team tell us if this will EVER be available?
68 Replies
Same Q - Can we get an update from Netgear on this?
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- We just upgraded to the new ORBI WIFI 6 mesh network. I was so disappointed to find out the circle is not compatible. Please let me know what the est time it will be for the circle to work with this or at least let us know if you are not planning to make this work so I can replace my system. It is rough to not have the parental controls during this time.
I just received my Orbi Ultra-Performance Mesh WiFi System - AX6000 - 2 pack (RBK852) and am astounded that there are no parental controls at all. The website is very misleading on this, it makes it look like Circle is included on the entire Orbi line.
Looking into this issue through the forums shows it's a long standing issue with the AX#### series, with no clear response from Netgear as to if/when it will be added as of 9/12/2020.
- When will AX6000 get Circle parental controls?
- Need to add Circle to AX6000 / RBK850!!
- Why No Circle for RBR750 or other Wifi6 Routers??
- Does the newer Orbi wi-fi 6 router have parental controls yet (eg. Disney Circle)?
What an incredible let-down. There should be a huge, blinking warning on the AX product and order pages that says NO PARENTAL CONTROLS INCLUDED. Anything less is incredibly misleading.
Very disappointed in Netgear. I'm returning this immediately.
I second the need for Smart Parental Controls on the RBR750. Extremely frustrating and the orbi website is misleading.
When I was within my initial support window, I recevied this message from suppor on 2020-07-15:
"Circle with Disney is no longer available and will be replaced by NETGEAR Smart Parental Controls. About the Circle 2nd Gen. we don't have the app or hardware version to all Nighthawk/Orbi router for this. Netgear stopped already on the Circle 1st Gen as there was already a plan of replacing it. If you wanted to still use the RBR750 you can contact Circle as they have a physical device that can be added to your Orbi WiFi 6 Mesh router."
Then in response to when Smart Parental Control would be availalbe 2020-07-18:
"the Circle with Disney can still be used but this latest model of Orbi Mesh WiFi 6 router - RBR750 is currently not supporting any Parental Control features. For the Smart Parental Control's ETA possibly be after next month. Routers currently supporting Circle with Disney - https://kb.netgear.com/000044718/Which-NETGEAR-routers-support-Circle-Smart-Parental-Controls"
Well, looks like Netgear missed that month window. Netgear the Orbi router system is quite good for wifi. Software - not good.
- Next month was 6 months ago. Come on NETGEAR???
Last August Netgear told me that parental controls were on the way. I'm starting to think they lied to me. Bought mine at Costco. So may go ahead and return them. Netgear does your view this issue as important. Their competition does. Fairly simple equation there.
Following. Very disappointed with RBR750. Thankfully Costco will accept returns if not rectified soon.
Any replies here? I agree that this model needs some parental control and I would also agree that it's misleading because my expectations was that Circle would be available for all the Orbi models.
jjpank wrote:I've had my RBR750 for months now, and there still is no word on an implementation of the Circle app for it. It was an expensive router, and i thought it would come with that feature right out of the box when I bought it. I thought for sure it would come with parental control features, but it is worthless for any of those features without the Circle app.
Can anyone on the Netgear or Circle team tell us if this will EVER be available?
I called Netgear. The person I spoke with said parental controls will be added, but could not tell me when. I don't intend to wait much longer...
this is very dissapointig that it is not clearly disclosed and thus far they have not done anything about it. Pretty much Netgear is teling us not to buy Netgear anymore and use Linsys or others
I also recently bought the RBR750 Netgear Orbi Mesh (with WiFi 6) and was very disappointed that there are seemingly no parental controls. I can block a bunch of sites or keywords and give 1 IP address trusted priviledges...... but this is terrible. The hardware is fantastic, but without the ability to set parental controls, this is a step back from my old router......
So I just got an email from Netgear that says parental controls available now via Circle. Tried it. Not compatible with RBR750. Ridiculous.
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I was reallt disapointed to learn that my brand new RBR750 apparently missing parental control. The Orbi website advertises parental control as a great feature, and not actually including it with the latest model is a bad marketing and product management. I hope Netgear team can get their sh&t together and release support for Circeles soon.
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Any updates on this? Very expensive router to be used just as router.
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rxe wrote:bump
RBK853 user here and currently running Circle Plus (in "compatibility mode") and it's been a mixed results.
I've been in contact with Circle support and apparently in their latest update on their website, they show the RBK7xx (AX4200) ORBI being compatible with Circle provided you run in compatibility mode, but not the RBK8xx (AX6000):
⚠︎ Orbi RBR850, RBK852, and RBK853 (We are investigating issues with these routers)Circle support says the latest firmware from Netgear supposedly makes it compatible but didn't elaborate further and I am past my 90 days complimentary tech support priviledge with Netgear to open a ticket to inquire about it.bump
- Let's go netgear! one of the reasons I bought this router was because that circle was included. Only after I bought it did I find out it was not but soon it will come out. Well guess what it still hasn't come out.
let's go Netgear your documentation is very misleading and I'm very unhappy I spent all this money on a new orbi router and I'm still not getting the features I expect.
Between initial instability issues and now lack of functionality I'm disappointed overall with this router. - I am beyond frustrated with this router. Over $400 for a system that just relays traffic? No parental controls is appalling and a very shady sales tactic because like others I saw the circle plug and thought this would work. Get it together netgear.
Considering there are posts from 8/2 that mention owning the router for months with no change, I wouldn't hold your breath. I've been keeping tabs on this topic and there's been no change. Purely speculation, but my guess is they don't want to keep spending the licensing fee for a third party service and the in-house development process hit serious problems.
I returned mine—Netgear customer service didn't bat an eye when I told them why. To their credit, it was one of the smoothest RMA processes. They got that part right at least.
I picked up one of the new eero Pro 6 wifi6 packages and it's working exactly as expected. The parental controls aren't as good as Circle or Gryphon, IMO, but at least they 1) are present 2) work and 3) don't mess up the rest of the router's functionality. Your mileage may vary, of course.
