[WarOnPrivacy]

     the Motorola MotoSync+ app is required to set up all new compatible
     WiFi routers released by Motorola

AFAIK, more Motorola routers are installed by cable ISPs than anywhere else. Many or most have WiFi. I can't imagine cable installers are futzing with a phone app.

[yonatan8070]

You'd be surprised, at work we recently had a contractor install a new office network (growing startup upgrading from the home grade units we had before), they recommended HP Aruba Instant On, and the guy did all the setup on his phone with their app.

Now that it's my network to manage, I have to say that while it's a huge upgrade from the TP-Link Deco units we had before, the cloud management just makes it worse. The web UI is slow, probably because every click requires a round trip from my laptop, to a datacenter somewhere, to the router/switch/AP 5m away from me, back to the datacenter, and back to my laptop.

[WarOnPrivacy]

You may be more right (and me more wrong) than you know. Another comment said their parent's ISP-provided router requires a phone to config.

ref:https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48425611#48432024

[yonatan8070]

This is also the case for the TP-Link Decos we were using, you can only configure and manage them from the app, no local web UI in sight*

And it's not like a mobile app unlocked some new features that couldn't be implemented in a browser. The app is slow, sluggish, and basic things like adding a DHCP reservation took multiple tries to succeed, each taking an agonizingly long time of watching a spinner.

If you contrast this with my home MikroTik, the UI is less "your grandma could configure it" simple, but it's fast, available over local web, SSH, desktop app, mobile app, and I think also an API, and has every feature I can think of from basic bridging to complex routing and firewalling.

* there was a very basic web UI that I recall had like 1 or 2 settings, don't remember which exactly.