Free Ekahau Alternatives in 2026 — Including Ones With Zero Setup

The 2026 lineup, by what it takes to start

"Predictive" is the column that matters most — it is what people mean by an Ekahau alternative: you draw the building and the tool simulates coverage before anything is installed. The two setup columns are the ones that decide whether you are planning in the next five minutes.

Setup columns checked on each tool's own site on 24 September 2026. Ekahau AI Pro itself now has a browser edition, sold as its own paid licence.

"Browser tools can't do WiFi heatmaps" — a half-truth

You will read that free browser options are limited because heatmaps need on-device radio scans. That is true of a measured heatmap — a web page cannot read WiFi signal strength, so a survey needs a native app. It is not true of a predicted one, which is computed from the floor plan, the walls and the access point's datasheet. Ekahau's predictive design works the same way, and the maths runs in any browser. Where the line is, with the maths →

WiFi Heatmap (wifiheatmap.app)

We built this because the free landscape had a hole in it: predictive, browser-based, cross-vendor, no account, no sales call. It runs a simplified COST-231 multi-wall path-loss model — free-space loss plus the loss of every wall crossed — with per-material figures for drywall, wood, glass, coated glass, brick, concrete and metal, following ITU-R P.2040 and P.1238 and tabulated separately for 2.4, 5 and 6 GHz. 79 access point presets across 11 vendors carry datasheet antenna gain and published transmit power (estimated where a vendor publishes none), or you enter any radio by hand. Multi-floor plans with signal crossing between floors are in the paid tiers.

Limits I want to be upfront about: antennas are modelled from their gain in dBi with no 3D pattern (omnidirectional on a ceiling, one generic front-facing shape on a wall), interference from neighbouring networks is not in the signal estimate, and furniture and multipath are not modelled. Expect ±6–10 dB against a real measurement in typical homes and small offices, which is enough to settle placement for a 100 m² flat with two access points. For a 50,000 m² warehouse with metal racking it does not, and you should pay Ekahau or Hamina.

Free: unlimited access points in the editor, one floor, and a watermarked PNG export that includes five access points. A €9 seven-day pass, €29 a year, or €39 once for a perpetual licence removes the export cap and the watermark, and adds multi-floor, automatic channel assignment, placement optimisation and a branded client report. The floor plan never uploads — plans live in your browser.

Deconflict

A free, open-source browser planner that opens straight into the editor, with no account. It is genuinely good, and free where we charge: its automatic channel assignment and placement optimiser cost nothing, where ours are paid (conflict detection is free in both). Its heatmap reports relative signal bands rather than dBm, which matters if you are checking a design against a number.

When it fits: you want channel planning for free and relative coverage is enough. Full comparison →

UniFi Design Center

Ubiquiti's free predictive planner. Genuinely good, runs in the browser, opens without signing in (you sign in to save your progress), and lets you place any UniFi access point and see predicted coverage. It is also entirely locked to UniFi hardware — you cannot model an Aruba Instant On, a MikroTik cAP, or a generic third-party radio next to it.

When it fits: 100% UniFi bill of materials, no mixed vendors. For a homelab already standardised on UniFi, this is probably the right first stop.

Cambium Wi-Fi Designer

Same shape as UniFi Design Center, for Cambium. It is free, it runs in the browser, and it has a guest demo that needs no account; saving a design and emailing yourself the heat maps and bill of materials needs a Cambium SSO account. Its Cambium catalogue is thorough — Wi-Fi 7 and an outdoor sector model included. It will not model another vendor's access point, and the floor plan is uploaded to Cambium's cloud.

When it fits: you are buying Cambium. Full comparison →

Hamina Planner Lite

Hamina is the modern, browser-native challenger to Ekahau, and the most capable tool on this list after Ekahau itself — 3D propagation with real antenna patterns. Its free tier, Hamina Planner Lite, is capped at 3 access points and needs an account, and the company is sales-led.

When it fits: a small space inside the free cap, or a serious project where you want enterprise-grade RF modelling and do not mind a sales conversation. Full comparison →

NetSpot Free

NetSpot is a survey-first desktop product that does predictive planning in its PRO and Enterprise editions. The free edition is narrower than it is usually described, this site included until September: their own version comparison lists it as Inspector mode only — no Planning, no Survey, no export, non-commercial use. Neither kind of heatmap is in the free tier.

When it fits: you already have access points installed, you want measured rather than predicted coverage, and you will pay for PRO (€119 a year, or €179 once, read from their checkout on 11 September 2026). Full comparison →

TamoGraph trial

TamoGraph is genuinely capable — predictive heatmaps, survey and reports — and the 30-day trial lets you try all of it, with two catches: output is watermarked and projects cannot be saved. It is an honest demo rather than a free tier, downloaded straight from TamoSoft for Windows or macOS with no registration.

When it fits: one well-scoped project you can finish inside the trial window, on a machine you can install software on.

Ekahau HeatMapper

The original "Ekahau, but free". A Windows utility for walking a floor plan and recording signal — survey-based, not predictive — whose last build dates from 2017. Ekahau's own HeatMapper page now redirects to its paid heatmap products. If your goal is "plan before I drill", it was always the wrong category: a free WiFi heatmap in the browser does that part without a survey.

When it fits: rarely, in 2026. For post-install checks, a current survey app on a laptop or Android phone does the same job better.

So which one should you actually use?

• →Zero setup, any vendor, predictive: WiFi Heatmap (wifiheatmap.app). No download, no account, open it and start.
• →Free channel planning, relative coverage is fine: Deconflict.
• →Pure UniFi or pure Cambium shop: that vendor's own designer.
• →One-off serious project, willing to sign up and talk to sales: Hamina.
• →Multi-floor enterprise WLAN, 50+ access points: pay for Ekahau or Hamina.
• →Post-install validation only: a survey app. You do not need a planner.

Questions