How to Restart Your Router and Clear the DNS Cache Properly

Why does restarting the router fix streaming problems?

Because a restart clears out everything the router has piled up since it last started. Routers run for weeks without a break, and small problems build up in memory until something gives.

A restart does several things at once:

• It clears the router’s memory and restarts its software.
• It empties the table the router uses to track every open connection in the house.
• It empties the router’s own DNS cache, the list of website names it has already looked up.
• It reconnects to your ISP. On Bell Fibe, that means signing in again over PPPoE; on other providers it renews the connection and sometimes gives you a new public address.
• It restarts the Wi-Fi radios. Some routers also pick a fresh, quieter channel when they start.

What a restart can’t fix: a busy neighbourhood network in the evening, an area outage, weak Wi-Fi in a far room, an account problem, or a server-side error. If only one device or one channel misbehaves, the router is rarely the cause.

Signs a restart is worth trying

• Every device in the house is slow, not just the TV.
• Devices show “connected, no internet”.
• Apps say they can’t find or resolve the server, but your internet otherwise works.
• The trouble started after a power blip or storm.
• You can’t remember the last time the router was restarted.

What should you do before you restart?

Take two minutes to note what’s wrong and photograph the router’s label. That way you can tell if the restart helped, and you won’t be stuck if the wrong button gets pressed.

• Write down the symptom and the time. “Every channel buffers on the basement TV, 8:15 p.m.” is more useful later than “it’s slow”.
• Run a speed check from the TV spot. A before-and-after pair tells you whether the restart changed anything.
• Photograph the label on the gateway. It shows the default Wi-Fi name, Wi-Fi password and admin password. If anything gets reset by accident, you’ll need them.
• Check for an outage first. The MyBell, Rogers, TELUS and Helix Fi apps all show the status of your service. If there’s an outage in your area, a restart only adds wait time.
• Warn the house. Everyone loses internet for a few minutes, and on Bell fibre the home phone and Fibe TV go down too.

What is the right order to restart your equipment?

Modem first, router second, streaming device last, with a 30-second wait at the start. Each box depends on the one before it, so bringing them up in order avoids a router that starts before there’s any internet to connect to.

1. Unplug the streaming device, then the router, then the modem or gateway. Many Canadian homes have a single gateway that is both modem and router, like the Bell Giga Hub, Rogers Ignite gateway, TELUS Wi-Fi Hub or Vidéotron Helix Fi. In that case there’s only one box to unplug.
2. Include the fibre terminal if you have a separate one. Some fibre homes have an optical terminal (ONT) on the wall where the fibre comes in. Rogers recommends restarting both the ONT and the gateway on fibre. If the terminal has a battery backup unit, follow your provider’s instructions, because pulling one cord may not switch it off.
3. Wait at least 30 seconds. Bell and Rogers both give 30 seconds as the wait. It lets the power fully drain so the restart is complete.
4. Plug in the fibre terminal first, if you have one, and wait until its lights settle.
5. Plug in the modem or gateway and wait for a steady light. That can take a few minutes. Bell says the Giga Hub is ready when the front lights are solid white. Rogers says to allow at least five minutes when the light was red or amber.
6. Plug in your own router or main mesh unit, if you have one behind the gateway. Wait for it to show it’s online, then the other mesh units.
7. Restart the streaming device last. Use the menu restart, not the remote’s power button; the exact path for each device is in the table further down. That gives it a fresh address and an empty DNS cache.
8. Test. Open a live channel, and run a quick speed check from the TV spot.

How do you restart a Bell Giga Hub or Home Hub?

Use the power ring on the front of the Giga Hub or Home Hub 4000, the MyBell app, or the power cord. Bell documents all of these on its modem reboot support page.

On the modem itself

• Giga Hub and Home Hub 4000: press the power ring on the front, select Yes on the modem information screen, then press OK. The restart is done when the front lights are solid white.
• Home Hub 3000: press and hold the reset button on the side for five seconds. It’s done when all three lights are white and the screen says Fibe Internet is connected. Don’t hold the button longer than Bell says.

In the MyBell app

1. Open the MyBell app and sign in.
2. Tap Support at the bottom of the screen, then Internet.
3. Scroll down and tap Reboot your modem.
4. Tap Select & Continue after confirming the modem, then Reboot now.
5. Wait until the front lights are solid white.

On a computer, the same option is in MyBell under My services > Internet, in the Wi-Fi section: Reboot your modem. Bell notes that Fibe TV and home phone on fibre are also unavailable while the modem restarts.

With the power cord, unplug it from the outlet or the modem’s power supply, wait 30 seconds, plug it back in, and wait for the lights to stop cycling and turn solid.

How do you restart a Rogers Ignite gateway?

Use the Rogers Xfinity app, the gateway’s admin page, or the power cord. Rogers lays out all three on its gateway restart and reset page.

In the Rogers Xfinity app

1. Sign in with your MyRogers username and password. Older guides call this app Ignite WiFi Hub or Ignite HomeConnect; the steps are similar.
2. Select WiFi, then View WiFi equipment.
3. Select the gateway modem.
4. Select Restart, then Restart Gateway.

On the admin page

1. Connect to your Wi-Fi and open https://10.0.0.1 in a browser. If the browser warns about the certificate, choose Advanced and continue to 10.0.0.1.
2. Sign in with the username admin and the password on the gateway’s label, or the one you set.
3. Select Troubleshooting > Reset/Restore Gateway.
4. Choose Reset to restart the modem.

With the cord, unplug the gateway for about 30 seconds and plug it back in. On Rogers fibre, restart the fibre terminal and the gateway together; Rogers says the full process takes about 10 minutes. Don’t hold the WPS button on second- and third-generation gateways for 30 seconds: that’s the factory reset.

How do you restart a TELUS Wi-Fi Hub?

Pull the power cord from the back of the hub, wait about 10 seconds, plug it back in, and give it about five minutes. That’s the restart TELUS describes for its Wi-Fi Hub.

• Wait until the light on the front stops changing before you test anything.
• If the light stays off or shows no connection, check that the fibre cable at the back is fully seated. Handle it gently and don’t bend it sharply.
• If you have Optik TV, TELUS suggests a full reboot: unplug the TV equipment first, then the Wi-Fi Hub, and bring devices back one at a time after the hub is up.
• TELUS Boost Wi-Fi pods come back on their own after the hub restarts. If one stays offline, unplug that pod for 30 seconds.

TELUS also lets you trigger a restart from your My TELUS account, which helps when the hub is in a closet you can’t reach. The TELUS Connect app manages your Wi-Fi name, password and connected devices.

How do you restart a Vidéotron Helix Fi gateway?

Use the Helix Fi app or unplug the gateway for 30 seconds. The Helix Fi app can check your connection status and restart the gateway remotely; look for the restart option on the screen for your gateway.

1. Open the Helix Fi app and sign in with your Vidéotron account.
2. Check the connection status first. If the app shows an outage, a restart won’t help; wait for Vidéotron to fix it.
3. Choose the gateway restart option and confirm.
4. Or unplug the gateway for 30 seconds and plug it back in.
5. Wait until the light is steady, then restart your Helix TV terminals or streaming devices if they don’t reconnect on their own.

Vidéotron is the main internet provider in much of Quebec. If you’re setting up IPTV there, our Montreal IPTV page covers local channels and providers.

How do you restart an eero or TP-Link network?

Both apps can restart the whole network or a single unit. Pick “restart” or “reboot”, never “remove” or “reset”.

eero

• Whole network, current app: Settings > Advanced networking, tap the more-options icon at the top, then Restart Network and confirm.
• Whole network, older app: Settings > Network Settings, then Restart Network near the bottom.
• One eero: on the Home tab, tap that eero, tap the more-options icon and choose Restart. Restarting the gateway eero takes the whole network offline for a moment.
• App not responding: unplug the eero for 30 seconds and plug it back in.

TP-Link Deco

• Whole network: open the Network page in the Deco app, tap the network map, tap the icon in the top-right corner, then Reboot Network.
• One unit: on the network map, select the unit, tap the button in its top-right corner, then Reboot.
• Avoid Remove: in the same menu, Remove takes the unit out of your network and resets it.

TP-Link explains both in its Deco reboot and reset FAQ.

TP-Link Archer routers

Sign in at tplinkwifi.net. Many current models show a Reboot button at the top of the page; others put it under Advanced > System Tools > Reboot, next to the reboot schedule.

Mesh behind an ISP gateway

If your eero or Deco is plugged into a Bell, Rogers, TELUS or Vidéotron gateway, restart the gateway first and the mesh second. A mesh that starts before the gateway is online can come up without internet.

How do you properly restart the streaming device?

Use a real restart, not the remote’s power button. Most streaming sticks and smart TVs only go to sleep when you press power, so their memory, network address and DNS cache stay exactly as they were.

After the device comes back, open the IPTV app fresh rather than resuming it from the recent apps list. Most players load their channel list and guide when they start, so a fresh start also picks up any changes.

What’s the difference between restarting and resetting a router?

A restart turns the router off and on and keeps every setting. A reset, also called a factory reset, wipes the router back to how it left the factory. You almost never want a reset for a streaming problem.

How do you clear the DNS cache on each device?

On a computer, run one command. On phones, TVs and streaming sticks, restart the device or toggle airplane mode. Either way, the device forgets the addresses it looked up and asks fresh next time.

DNS is the internet’s phone book: it turns a name like a server address into a number your device can connect to. Devices keep recent answers for a while to save time. If an answer goes stale, for example because a server moved, the app can fail with “unable to resolve host” or connect to an address that no longer works.

Flush DNS on Windows, step by step

1. Open Command Prompt. Press Start, type cmd, then choose Run as administrator to be safe.
2. Type ipconfig /flushdns and press Enter.
3. Optional: get a fresh address too. Type ipconfig /release, press Enter, then ipconfig /renew. Your connection drops for a few seconds.
4. Close the window and retry the app.

Microsoft documents every ipconfig option on its ipconfig reference page.

Flush DNS on a Mac, step by step

1. Open Terminal from Applications > Utilities, or search for it with Spotlight.
2. Type sudo dscacheutil -flushcache; sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder and press Return.
3. Enter your Mac’s password when asked. Nothing shows as you type; that’s normal.
4. Retry the app. There’s no confirmation message.

Do you also need to clear the router’s and your ISP’s DNS cache?

The router’s cache clears when you restart it, so the restart steps above already handle it. Your ISP’s cache you can’t clear yourself; its entries expire on their own, usually within minutes to hours.

If a service has just moved to a new address and you keep getting the old one, the quickest way around a stale ISP answer is to ask a different DNS service. Public resolvers such as Cloudflare’s 1.1.1.1, Google’s 8.8.8.8 and Quad9’s 9.9.9.9 can be set on a single device or, on routers that allow it, for the whole house. Our comparison of the best DNS for streaming in Canada walks through those choices and where the setting lives on each device.

Be realistic about what DNS does. It only matters while an app is finding a server. Once a channel is playing, DNS plays no part, so flushing it won’t stop buffering in the middle of a stream.

Should you schedule automatic router restarts?

Only if a restart reliably fixes a problem that keeps coming back. A healthy router doesn’t need regular restarts, and a scheduled one at the wrong hour will cut off a game.

• TP-Link Deco: some models offer More > System > Reboot Schedule in the app, daily or weekly at a time you choose.
• TP-Link Archer: some models have a reboot schedule next to the reboot option under Advanced > System Tools. It runs on the router’s clock, so make sure the router’s time zone is right.
• ISP gateways: Bell, Rogers, TELUS and Vidéotron gateways update themselves and don’t usually offer a restart schedule.

Pick a quiet hour such as 4 a.m. local time, well clear of late games on the West Coast and early weekend Premier League matches out east. If your router needs a restart every day to keep working, that’s a sign it’s failing or overheating. Ask your ISP to check the gateway or swap it.

How do you know the restart worked?

Check three things: steady lights, every device back online, and normal speed at the TV. Then test the thing that was broken, not just a web page.

1. Look at the lights. Solid white on a Bell Giga Hub, a steady light on the others. Blinking usually means it’s still starting.
2. Check a second device. A phone on Wi-Fi should load a page right away.
3. Run the connection check below from the TV spot. Compare it with what your plan should deliver.
4. Open the IPTV app and play a live channel for a few minutes, including a channel change or two.
5. Note the time. If the problem comes back at the same time tomorrow, it’s more likely evening congestion than your router.

If the connection looks healthy and you want to see how live channels run on it before you commit, the 24-hour free trial is requested in live chat.

When won’t a restart fix the problem?

When the trouble is outside your router. Restarting again and again won’t help in these cases, so move on to the right fix.

• An area outage. Check your ISP’s app or outage page. Restarting during an outage only adds wait time.
• Evening slowdowns. If speed drops every evening and recovers overnight, see why IPTV slows down in the evening on Bell and Rogers.
• Weak Wi-Fi at the TV. A restart doesn’t move the router closer. Measure it with our guide to Wi-Fi vs Ethernet for IPTV.
• An error code from the server. A 401, 403 or 5xx error is about the account or the server, not your router. Our article on IPTV error codes 401 to 509 explains each one.
• One app or one device. Clear that app’s cache and check its settings, starting with our IPTV buffering fixes, or reinstall it using the Fire TV Stick setup guide.
• A firmware update in progress. If the lights show an update, leave the power alone until it finishes.

If you’ve done a proper restart and the stream still misbehaves, our support desk can look at it with you through live chat on the support page, every day from 9 a.m. to midnight Eastern. If you’re comparing services, our IPTV Canada plans in CAD start at $17 for 1 month on 1 device, and every option is on the IPTV subscription page.