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Every UniFi gateway, side by side.

The gateway is the box the internet plugs into. It is the router, the firewall and the brain that runs the rest of the UniFi gear. The steps up buy you speed, more devices, camera recording, and built-in power for the gear. This page shows which step buys what.

The short answer

Three gateways cover most jobs.

A HOME OR SMALL OFFICE, NO CAMERAS

Cloud Gateway Ultra

Gigabit routing, 30 UniFi devices, five ports, six watts. The cheapest way to run a proper UniFi network.

A HOME OR OFFICE WITH A FEW CAMERAS

Cloud Gateway Max

Same brain plus a slot for a drive, so it records up to five 4K cameras. No separate recorder box.

A BUSINESS WITH A RACK

Dream Machine Pro

Rack mount, a real hard drive bay for eight 4K cameras, 100 devices, 10 gigabit fibre ports.

The whole line

Every model, every number that matters.

Cheapest on the left. Scroll sideways on a phone. Prices are all-in, the number you pay at checkout, and they update daily.

Model
Ubiquiti UniFi Express
UniFi Express
Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Ultra
Cloud Gateway Ultra
Ubiquiti UniFi Express 7
UniFi Express 7
Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Max
Cloud Gateway Max
Ubiquiti Dream Router 7
Dream Router 7
Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Fiber
Cloud Gateway Fiber
Ubiquiti Dream Machine Pro
Dream Machine Pro
Ubiquiti Dream Machine SE
Dream Machine SE
Ubiquiti Dream Router 5G Max
Dream Router 5G Max
Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Industrial
Cloud Gateway Industrial
Ubiquiti Dream Machine Pro Max
Dream Machine Pro Max
Ubiquiti Dream Wall
Dream Wall
Ubiquiti Dream Machine Beast
Dream Machine Beast
Ubiquiti Enterprise Fortress Gateway
Enterprise Fortress Gateway
Ubiquiti Enterprise Firewall Core
Enterprise Firewall Core
Price, all in Ask us $182 all-in $307 all-in $307 all-in $431 all-in $431 all-in $588 all-in $771 all-in $771 all-in $895 all-in $926 all-in $1,487 all-in $2,319 all-in $2,879 all-in $5,415 all-in
Best for One room. A rental, a kiosk, a cabin. Four UniFi devices, no more. A home or small office with its own access points and no cameras. The floor of the real UniFi line. A flat or a small office where one Wi-Fi point in the router is enough. A home or office with up to five cameras and no rack. The sweet spot for most houses. A small home that wants one box: router, Wi-Fi, and a single camera. A home or office on a fibre internet line, or one that needs 10 gigabit inside. A business with a rack. Offices, clinics, shops with up to eight cameras. A small business that wants the gateway and the PoE switch in one box. A site with no wired internet, or one that must stay up if the fibre is cut. A construction trailer, a rural house, a shop. A plant, a yard, an unheated building. Where a normal gateway would freeze or fill with dust. A business with 10 to 15 cameras, or one that wants a backup drive. A small office or shop with no rack and no closet. Everything on one wall plate. A building. A campus. Forty cameras and hundreds of devices from one box. A large office or a data room where the gateway is only a firewall and cameras live elsewhere. A campus core. Far beyond any building we would put UniFi in.
Routing speed with security on n/a 1 Gbps 2.3 Gbps 2.3 Gbps 2.3 Gbps 5 Gbps 3.5 Gbps 3.5 Gbps 2.3 Gbps 5 Gbps 5 Gbps 3.5 Gbps 25 Gbps 12.5 Gbps 79 Gbps
UniFi devices it can run 4 30+ 30+ 30+ 30+ 50+ 100+ 100+ 30+ 50+ 200+ 100+ 750+ 500+ 2,250+
Phones and laptops 50+ 300+ 300+ 300+ 300+ 500+ 1,000+ 1,000+ 300+ 500+ 2,000+ 300+ 7,500+ 5,000+ 22,500+
Records cameras No No No 5 at 4K 1 at 4K 5 at 4K 8 at 4K 8 at 4K 1 at 4K 5 at 4K 15 at 4K 4 at 4K 40 at 4K No No
Where video is stored Does not record Does not record Does not record SSD you add Does not record SSD you add One hard drive bay One hard drive bay microSD card microSD card Two hard drive bays Built-in Two hard drive bays Does not record Does not record
Wi-Fi built in Yes No Yes No Yes No No No Yes Yes No Yes No No No
Powers gear over the cable No No No No 15.4 W 30 W No 180 W 15.4 W Yes, 270 W No 420 W No No No
Fast ports Gigabit 2.5 gig 10 gig copper 2.5 gig 10 gig fibre 10 gig fibre, 10 gig copper 10 gig fibre 10 gig fibre 10 gig fibre 10 gig fibre, 10 gig copper 10 gig fibre 10 gig fibre 25 gig fibre, 10 gig fibre, 10 gig copper 25 gig fibre, 10 gig fibre 100 gig, 25 gig fibre, 10 gig copper
Rack or shelf Shelf Shelf Shelf Shelf Shelf Shelf Rack, 1U Rack, 1U Shelf Shelf Rack, 1U Wall panel Rack, 1U Rack, 1U Rack, 1U
Power draw 10 W 6.2 W 22 W 16.1 W 26 W 29.4 W 33 W 50 W 34.5 W 28 W 60 W 532 W 100 W 82 W 171 W

Specs from techspecs.ui.com, checked against the live pages. Prices from the Ubiquiti Canada store including the memory surcharge the product pages hide. Ask us means Ubiquiti has not listed a Canadian price we can verify yet.

Step by step

What the next dollar buys you.

Read down the list. Each line is what you gain by moving up one model.

  1. Step up to Cloud Gateway Ultra: Thirty devices instead of four, five ports, and room for a real network. Bring your own access point.

  2. Step up to UniFi Express 7: +$125 Wi-Fi 7 built in and 2.3 gigabit routing, if you would rather not buy a separate access point.

  3. $307 all-in

    Step up to Cloud Gateway Max: Same price A slot for a drive, so five 4K cameras record straight into the gateway. You give up the built-in Wi-Fi.

  4. Step up to Dream Router 7: +$124 Five gigabit routing, fibre ports, 30 watts of PoE, 50 devices. Same five cameras.

  5. $431 all-in

    Step up to Cloud Gateway Fiber: Same price Fibre ports, five gigabit routing, 30 watts of PoE and five cameras instead of one.

  6. Step up to Dream Machine Pro: +$157 A real hard drive bay and eight 4K cameras. A rack box for a business.

  7. Step up to Dream Machine SE: +$183 180 watts of PoE built in. The only rack gateway that powers its own cameras.

  8. $771 all-in

    Step up to Dream Router 5G Max: Same price Two drive bays, 15 cameras, five gigabit routing, 200 devices.

  9. Step up to Cloud Gateway Industrial: +$124 A rugged box rated to minus 30 with 90 watt PoE ports, for a plant or a yard.

  10. Step up to Dream Machine Pro Max: +$31 Two drive bays and 15 cameras in a rack box.

  11. Step up to Dream Wall: +$561 A whole wall panel: gateway, 17 port PoE switch, Wi-Fi and recorder in one unit on the wall.

  12. $1,487 all-in

    Step up to Dream Machine Beast: +$832 25 gigabit routing, 40 cameras, 750 devices. The top of the camera-capable line.

  13. $2,319 all-in

    Step up to Enterprise Fortress Gateway: +$560 A firewall with no recorder at all. You have left the camera world.

  14. Step up to Enterprise Firewall Core: +$2,536 79 gigabit routing and 100 gigabit ports. A core for a campus.

  15. Top of the line on this page.

What every gateway needs

Three things people get wrong.

1

The internet handed over in bridge mode

Your internet company box has to stop being the router, or you end up with two routers fighting. We set the provider box to bridge or pass-through so the UniFi gateway does the job.

2

A PoE switch, usually

Most gateways here do not power cameras and access points. That is the switch. The Dream Machine SE, the Dream Wall and the Cloud Gateway Fiber are the exceptions with real PoE budgets. See switches.

3

A drive if it records

A gateway that records cameras needs a drive. The small ones take an SSD. The Dream Machines take a proper surveillance hard drive, which is what you want for weeks of footage. See recorders.

Before you ask

Common questions.

Do I need a gateway if I have the internet company router?

Yes, if you want UniFi to run the network. The provider box gets set to bridge mode and the UniFi gateway takes over. Otherwise you have two routers fighting and none of the UniFi features work properly.

Which one records cameras?

Cloud Gateway Max and Fiber record five 4K cameras on an SSD. The Dream Router 7 records one. The Dream Machine Pro and SE record eight on a real hard drive. Pro Max does 15, the Beast 40. Ultra, Express and the Enterprise firewalls do not record at all.

Does it power my cameras and access points?

Most do not. The Dream Machine SE (180 W), the Dream Wall (420 W), the Cloud Gateway Fiber (30 W) and the Industrial do. Everything else needs a PoE switch beside it.

Do you set these up?

Yes, in person in Calgary or remotely anywhere in Canada. See the remote gateway setup page. A design assessment picks the right one and the fee comes off the install.

Keep reading

Want it picked and installed?

Book a design assessment. We count the devices and cameras you will really have, pick the gateway with room to grow, and quote it. The fee comes off the install.