When I attend CES, I love to stop by smaller booths and find out what their product is all about. A couple of years ago I stopped by a super small booth at a private press event for a product called Gryphon. The owner of the company was manning the booth, and I had a chance to talk to him about his new wireless router. After our brief conversation, I could NOT wait for his product to be released.
He showed me some amazing parental controls baked right into the wireless router, and I was SOLD. I have used a ton of different wireless routers, and none of them have really gotten parental controls right yet. So, I have waited patiently for the Gryphon to come out for the last couple years, thinking that surely another router would figure it out before this one hit the market. I was wrong, and I am super happy that I was.
First, this is not a sponsored post. I WAS given one Gryphon router to facilitate this review, but honestly, I’m about to purchase a second one for my home because I like it so much.
It took me a while to get it out of the box, and then even longer to get set up, but the reason is I have SO many devices connected to my wireless network. Many IoT devices (like my garage door opener, my PetNet, and more) are a huge pain to change the wireless connection. So, I set up the Gryphon as a brand new wifi network so I could change over devices as time allowed.
The first devices I changed over to the new network were my children’s phones, tablets, gaming systems and more. This way I could take advantage of the awesome parental controls baked into the Gryphon router. I really liked connecting each device to the new network individually, because it was super easy to figure out which device it was on the router itself.
As you connect a device, the phone you use to manage the router will get a notification that a new device has been discovered.
It will then ask you to name the device, and assign the device type (it will try to autodiscover the type of device, like phone or gaming console), and then you can also assign a user to the device. Each member of the family is created as a user within the Gryphon app. You can assign some devices to the entire family (like the family computer) and other devices individually to users.
There are several settings you can create for the individual users.
Not only can you set limits for specific apps (the only downside here is it is a limited number of apps to choose from, and is not based on the actual apps installed on your child’s device). You can set bedtimes and force safe search on Google searches as well.
Another thing I wish the parental controls had was the ability to type in a specific URL to block. You can go into their browsing history and block sites from there, but you can’t just type in a URL and block it.
I do get notifications when my child wants to visit a site they have been informed is blocked, and I can allow it from my app, which works great.
Aside from the great parental controls, the Gryphon can also detect malware that someone in the family might accidentally come across. It uses my favorite antivirus company to help detect it, ESET.
One of my favorite features is the ability to put the internet to bed at a specific time every night, or just disable the internet for a specific child (for example when they get grounded… don’t ask me how I know)
The user interface for the router is extremely easy to use and looks beautiful, and I’m a HUGE user interface snob. I actually love how it separates my devices into categories like TV & Entertainment, where you would find smart TV’s and Roku devices or “Things”… of which I have several like my Ring Doorbell and my Nest thermostat.
The router works with other Gryphon routers to create a mesh system which ensures wireless coverage throughout your entire home. The company has really thought about every aspect of your home, including safety for your family. I did speed tests with my devices, and they were not any slower with the Gryphon router than they were with my ultra-powerful $600 router.
I really love this router. It is way better than a standard wireless router with something like a Circle device (which I have found significantly slows down wireless networks). Definitely go check it out! It gets my Family Tech Zone seal of approval!
This post may contain affiliate links, which means I receive compensation if you make a purchase using the links.
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