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I would like to connect my phone to a router so that I can share its internet connection among the devices in my house. How do I connect the phone to the WAN port of my router so that the router is 'getting its internet' from the phone? Will a normal microusb to ethernet adapter do it, like this one? (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Micro-USB-5-Pin-10-100-Mbps-RJ45-LAN-Ethernet-Adapter-for-Tablet-PC-S6-/321629022330?pt=UK_Computing_USB_Cables&hash=item4ae295687a)

I have a tethering plan, and a spare phone I am not using, which is why I am doing it this way and not with a dongle and usb router. Some of the devices I want to connect don't use wifi or will just work better with wired connections, which is why I want to attach the phone to the router via a cable.

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  • I have the same question. I know it is possible to do this with just a normal phone usb cable. But it will only work with some routers. I understand it may work with some Asus routers and it may work with dd-wrt. Another possibility is the Australian ROOTer project (based on openwrt). I am trying to learn the details to get this work. Hope someone answers this question.
    – MountainX
    Aug 29, 2015 at 2:29
  • What is dd-wrt?
    – Ne Mo
    Aug 29, 2015 at 17:24
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    dd-wrt.com It is an open source (linux-based) router firmware (operating system). Others are openwrt and tomato.
    – MountainX
    Aug 30, 2015 at 0:35

2 Answers 2

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I got this working today. I bought an Asus RT-AC68P router. It works out of the box. I just connected my phone to the router's USB 3.0 port using a normal phone usb cable (same one used for charging, etc.).

All Asus routers have the same firmware, so this should work "out of the box" with any new-ish Asus router.

I am not impressed with the Asus setup procedure when using a USB 4G modem/phone for WAN, but I ultimately got it working. I prefer working with dd-wrt myself.

This functionality is supposed to work with dd-wrt too, but today I also purchased a BUFFALO AirStation AC 1750 DD-WRT Router (WZR-1750DHPD) with firmware "DD-WRT v24SP2-(8/12/14) std" and I could not get it to work. I will try a newer or different version of dd-wrt in the near future.

Here are some references for more reading on the topic:

DD-WRT Forum :: View topic - 4G USB Modem http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=981336#981336

"I can recommend Kong Mod to achieve this. Works right out of the box, at leastt for me. I recently lost my wired internet connection and used a 3G dongle as backup. The only thing I did was to plug in the dongle, select '3G/4G' as Wan connection and filled in the APN. Everything worked directly, no additional modules to load. Success or failure is of course dependent on the dongle being supported."

DD-WRT Forum :: View topic - BS build 14144 3G/UTMS option http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=69970&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=60&sid=3a47d435b696e5f108ef1475040e1337

Mobile Broadband - DD-WRT Wiki http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Mobile_Broadband

As of 04/04/09 we support UMTS 3G / 3.xG / 4G/ LTE and CDMA2000(EV-DO) modems connected via the USB port or as mPCIe cards.

Of Modems and Men http://ofmodemsandmen.com/index.html

DD-WRT Router Benefits - #5: Take Full Use of a 3G USB Modem or 4G MiFi Mobile Hotspot http://www.flashrouters.com/blog/2012/03/26/dd-wrt-router-benefits-advantages-5-taking-full-use-of-a-3g-usb-dongle-or-4g-mifi-mobile-hotspot/

Share network of Android mobile phone to the router (USB 3G tethering) | SmallNetBuilder Forums http://www.snbforums.com/threads/share-network-of-android-mobile-phone-to-the-router-usb-3g-tethering.9624/

This page contains screen shots of the Asus router firmware and some minimal instructions for how to use a 4G phone as the WAN connection.

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    Useful, but this can only work for routers that have a usb, which many of them don't... I asked about connecting it to WAN
    – Ne Mo
    Mar 29, 2018 at 11:34
  • At least some routers do have USB ports, making my solution a practical one. On the other hand, I have never seen a mobile phone with an RJ45 jack for connecting directly to a WAN port. Neither have I seen a router where the WiFi antenna was on the WAN side. Given that nobody else has given you a better solution in almost 3 years, please go ahead and mark my answer as accepted.
    – MountainX
    Mar 30, 2018 at 20:41
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    No, sorry, but it's not the answer to the specific question I asked. Useful information for someone and I'm glad you posted it (I am the one who upvoted), but still
    – Ne Mo
    Mar 31, 2018 at 22:10
  • ...and adapters exist for connecting phones to lan, too
    – Ne Mo
    Apr 1, 2018 at 11:51
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You could also try openwrt or rooter. I got these to work with straight tethering but couldn't get them to work with a vpn. My solution was to buy a Asus router. I was actually searching getting greedy looking for a way to use both usb ports for tethering with 2 phones at the same time.

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