What baby monitor range do I need in a two-up two-down?

What is a two-up two-down in radio terms?

A two-up two-down is a small UK house: two rooms downstairs, two bedrooms upstairs, usually a narrow terrace or a small semi. The walk from the back bedroom to the kitchen is short. The radio path is not. It crosses one timber floor, often a chimney breast, and two party walls that sit a few metres from the next house's router.

Which? never names this house type. Its range test is still the right shape: three rooms, then outdoors. You do not need a 300-metre open-space claim. You need a parent unit that still shows a clear picture in the kitchen and at the garden door after 7pm, when the terrace Wi-Fi is up.

This is one floor of separation, not two. If the cot is in a loft or a second storey, use the two-floor page. If the fail is next door's baby on the speaker, use the terrace neighbours page.

Front-to-back versus one floor up

BT quotes up to 50 metres indoors only with a clear line of sight. A two-up two-down is perhaps eight to twelve metres wall to wall. The metres are not the shortage. The closed door, the stack and the router on the mantel are.

How do I walk-test a two-up two-down?

Do it the evening the box arrives, while the return window is still open. One pass at 10am is not enough on a terrace.

1. 1
   Baby unit at the cot, facing the stairs Not in the chimney alcove, not on the party wall. Cable out of reach of the cot (Lullaby Trust).
2. 2
   Landing, then kitchen Stay in the kitchen a minute with the kettle and the extractor. BT: parent unit beeps when it is out of range.
3. 3
   Front room Stand in the bay. If this is where you sit at night, a landing-only pass is the wrong test.
4. 4
   Garden door Open it and step out. Write pass or fail. This is Which?'s indoor-to-outdoor step, scaled to a yard.
5. 5
   Move once, then decide If only the alcove placement failed, you have a stack problem. If kitchen and garden door fail after a doorway placement, keep the room list for the return.

Chimney breast and party walls in a short terrace

The same brick column often serves the back bedroom and the kitchen. The cot alcove aims through it. Slide the cot-side unit toward the landing so the path goes down the stairwell, then across the downstairs room, instead of through the stack. That is the whole of the chimney-breast guide, applied to a house that is only one room deep on each floor.

Party walls add the street's 2.4 GHz. Sit both units a metre off that wall and a metre from the router (BT and Angelcare both use a one-metre keep-off for electrics and metal). A second analogue kit in the hallway can add to the clutter; BT says it cannot promise two kits in one premises will stay clear.

Is the box range the wrong number?

Yes, if you are shopping by open-space metres. Babysense says open space is the only common quoted method because every home differs. BT says any obstruction cuts the indoor figure significantly. In a two-up two-down the obstruction is a metre away, not 80 metres away.

A booster or mesh pack does not add legal power to a closed parent-unit link. Placement and an evening walk-test come first. The Lullaby Trust's position is still that a monitor is not a substitute for an adult in the same room for the first six months.

In shortA two-up two-down needs a kitchen-and-garden-door pass, not a long-range box. Face the stairwell, walk around the chimney breast, sit off the party wall, and do the three short walks after 7pm. If those hold, the house is not too big.