The TP-Link Archer AX10 is a budget-friendly Wi-Fi 6 router. While its hardware is solid for the price, the stock firmware is often criticized for being "walled garden" oriented—pushing TP-Link cloud accounts and lacking advanced networking tools. Custom firmware transforms this humble device into a power-user tool.
But before you get excited, there is a massive caveat:
Supported (Snapshot builds only)
Advanced traffic shaping to prioritize gaming or streaming over other network tasks.
Contrary to rumors on forums, DD-WRT has not released a stable build for the MediaTek MT7915E chipset in the AX10. While DD-WRT supports many MediaTek routers, the specific Wi-Fi 6 driver combination for the AX10 is missing. Flashing a generic MT7621 DD-WRT build will likely kill your 5GHz radio. archer ax10 custom firmware
The AX10 comes in hardware revisions (v1, v1.2, v1.6, etc.).
The AX10 shares hardware with the Asus RT-AX58U (sort of). However, Asuswrt-Merlin requires proprietary Asus bootloaders and significantly more NAND flash. Porting is impossible without hardware modification. The TP-Link Archer AX10 is a budget-friendly Wi-Fi 6 router
That 16 MB of flash is the primary bottleneck. Modern custom firmware distributions like OpenWrt have grown significantly. A full build with a web interface (LuCI) barely fits into 16 MB, leaving almost no room for additional packages. Furthermore, the MT7915E driver is relatively new. While it is now open-source and merged into the main Linux kernel (as of 2021), it was a nightmare for early adopters.
The TP-Link Archer AX10 is positioned as an entry-level gateway into the world of Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax). For many users, it works perfectly fine out of the box: decent speeds, basic QoS, and standard parental controls. However, under the hood, the AX10 suffers from the same ailments as most consumer routers: limited configuration options, infrequent security updates, a clunky web interface, and a lack of advanced features like VPN server integration, ad blocking, or detailed network monitoring. But before you get excited, there is a