GL.iNet Flint 4 (GL-BE14000): Specs, Features, Pros & Cons
Ten Ethernet sockets sit on the back of the Flint 4, and two of them run at 10 Gigabit: a copper RJ45 port and an SFP+ cage that takes a fiber module or a direct-attach cable. Either can carry the internet connection, and so can a third port running at 2.5G. Below those come three more 2.5G LAN ports and four gigabit ones, so the slowest sockets on the router are plain gigabit.
GL.iNet aims the Flint 4 at homelabs and small offices, and pairs the ports with a MediaTek Filogic 880 quad-core chip, 2 GB of memory and 64 GB of eMMC storage. That leaves room for logs, network shares and the add-ons GL.iNet bundles with its OpenWrt-based firmware: AdGuard Home, Tailscale, ZeroTier, Tor and a DPI engine that sorts traffic by application. LuCI and the wider OpenWrt package library sit underneath for anyone who outgrows the standard admin panel.
A 2.4-inch touchscreen on the front shows connection status and can start a repeater or tethering link without a browser. Two USB 3.0 ports, one Type-A and one Type-C, handle storage and phone tethering.
The wireless side is tri-band Wi-Fi 7 across six foldable antennas, with three streams on 5 GHz and 6 GHz and two on 2.4 GHz. The BE14000 in the name is the three radios' peak rates added together and rounded up, and GL.iNet's own per-band figures sum to a little under that. No phone or laptop sees the total. A client connects at the rate of the band it joins, or of a combination of bands when it supports Multi-Link Operation.
GL.iNet budgets up to 45 W with USB devices attached, so the router runs from a 12 V, 4 A power adapter, and it can be wall mounted as well as set on a desk.
Category strengths
Where the GL.iNet Flint 4 (GL-BE14000) beats the median
- A much higher WAN port speed ?10 Gbps vs 2.5 Gbps (median)
- A much higher max wireless speed ?13,657 Mbps vs 7,876 Mbps (median)
- A much higher coverage area ?3,100 sq ft vs 2,000 sq ft (median)
- More LAN ports ?7 vs 4 (median)
- Much more RAM ?2,048 MB vs 1,024 MB (median)
- More max connected devices ?250 vs 189 (median)
- More antennas ?6 vs 4 (median)
- A higher processor speed ?1.8 GHz vs 1.5 GHz (median)
Where the GL.iNet Flint 4 (GL-BE14000) trails the median
- A much heavier build ?1,166 g vs 762.5 g (median)
How this VS Score was computed
Score 72: each known spec is measured against the median of all wi-fi routers (26 products), then weighted; 50 means level with that median. In classes of six or more, a value beyond the class’s 10th–90th percentile range counts as that limit, so one extreme product cannot set the scale. 71% of the scoreable weight could be used; unknown values, features not applicable to this class and proxies (battery capacity where a rated life exists) add or remove nothing.
| Specification | This product | Cohort median | Score weight | Points moved |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| WAN port speed | 10 | 2.5 | 1.5 | +75.0 |
| 6 GHz band | Yes | 52% of the class have it | 1 | +50.0 |
| Multi-gig LAN | Yes | 69% of the class have it | 0.8 | +40.0 |
| Max wireless speed | 13,657 — capped at the class’s upper range (10,688) | 7,876 | 2 | +36.0 |
| RAM | 2,048 | 1,024 | 0.7 | +35.0 |
| Coverage area | 3,100 — capped at the class’s upper range (2,750) | 2,000 | 1.5 | +28.5 |
| Built-in security suite | Yes | 52% of the class have it | 0.5 | +25.0 |
| LAN ports | 7 — capped at the class’s upper range (5) | 4 | 1 | +13.0 |
| Max connected devices | 250 | 189 | 0.5 | +8.0 |
| Antennas | 6 | 4 | 0.3 | +7.5 |
| Processor speed | 1.8 | 1.5 | 0.5 | +5.0 |
| Wall-mountable | Yes — held to half its range (class of fewer than six) | 75% of the class have it | 0.2 | +5.0 |
| Weight | 1,166 | 762.5 | 0.2 | −3.4 |
| Wi-Fi standard | Wi-Fi 7 | Wi-Fi 7 | 2 | +0.0 |
| Frequency bands | 3 | 3 | 1 | +0.0 |
| USB ports | 2 — capped at the class’s upper range (1) | 1 | 0.3 | +0.0 |
| Processor cores | 4 | 4 | 0.5 | +0.0 |
Not scored: MU-MIMO (unknown: not scored); OFDMA (unknown: not scored); Beamforming (unknown: not scored); Link aggregation (standard for the class (80% have it)); WPA3 (standard for the class (100% have it)); Mesh support (unknown: not scored); Guest network (standard for the class (100% have it)); Parental controls (standard for the class (100% have it)); Quality of Service (QoS) (standard for the class (100% have it)); VPN server (standard for the class (100% have it)); App control (unknown: not scored).
Editor’s note
The Flint 3 ships on OpenWrt 23.05, and the Flint 4's datasheet gives OpenWrt 21.02 on Linux 5.4, so the newer router runs the older foundation. For owners who stay inside GL.iNet's admin panel, the base version stays out of sight. Anyone planning to pull packages from the wider OpenWrt ecosystem should check which release those packages target first.
GL.iNet rates this router at up to 1.5 Gbps through WireGuard and through OpenVPN with DCO, measured in its own lab, which is more than twice the figure it gives the Flint 3. That headroom is aimed at one kind of household in particular: one that sends all of its traffic through a commercial VPN or back to an office over a line faster than a gigabit.
I would want to know what will plug into the 10G ports before buying. The copper one needs a 10G switch, NAS or workstation on the other end, and the SFP+ cage needs a module, a DAC cable or a fiber service that ends in one. Without that equipment, the step up from the Flint 3 brings a screen, more storage and sockets that stay empty.
The closest rival with a fast fiber port is the Ubiquiti UDR7. It has a 10G SFP+ internet port too, adds a controller for UniFi cameras and access points, and keeps everything inside the UniFi app, which suits a buyer who wants a managed system more than an open one.
Specifications
Quality bars show where each figure sits between the lowest and highest of the 26 wi-fi routers this VS Score is measured against.
Wireless
Ports & wired
Hardware
Features & security
Design
Networking assessment
What the specification table does not say on its own: what this device needs to connect, what speeds are realistic, what costs extra, and where it falls short. Every statement below is read from the verified sheet or written by an editor — nothing is estimated.
Test environment
Research-based assessment: this brief is derived from the manufacturer’s published specifications for the GL.iNet Flint 4 (GL-BE14000) and the documents listed under Sources and verification. We have not run this unit on our own network, so nothing here is a measurement of ours.
Connection requirements
The WAN (internet) port is rated at 10 Gbps. An internet plan faster than that is capped at the router, and nothing on the network can download faster than this port regardless of the wireless figures.
There are 7 LAN ports, at least one of them multi-gig, so one wired device can run above Gigabit speed.
Throughput expectations
The Wi-Fi 7 headline of 13,657 Mbps adds together the theoretical peak of every band. A single device connects to one band at a time, so no client ever sees the total, and real-world speeds run well below the link rate even in the same room.
The 6 GHz band is only usable by Wi-Fi 6E or Wi-Fi 7 clients and has noticeably shorter range through walls; older devices stay on the 5 GHz and 2.4 GHz bands.
Firmware and subscriptions
The Flint 4 shipped on firmware 4.9.1, released August 8, 2026, and 4.9.2 followed on September 28 with support for SFP+ DAC cables, Wi-Fi fixes for some IoT devices and a fix for iPhone 17 tethering. A 4.11.0 build is in testing. Updates install from the Upgrade page of the web Admin Panel, either online or from a downloaded file. Bark normally charges for its parental-control service, and GL.iNet says the Bark Home plan is included on the Flint 4 at no extra cost.
A built-in security suite is on the spec sheet. On most brands the full version is a paid subscription after a trial; check the manufacturer’s page linked under Sources for the current terms.
Parental controls are listed; on several brands the scheduling and filtering tiers sit behind the same subscription as the security suite.
VPN support is built in, which avoids a subscription to a third-party VPN router service for remote access.
Security support
WPA3 is supported, the current Wi-Fi encryption standard; devices that only speak WPA2 still connect in mixed mode.
A guest network is available for visitors and smart-home devices, keeping them off the network your computers use.
Security-update cadence is not something manufacturers publish as a specification; see Support and updates below.
Real-world household suitability
The manufacturer rates coverage at 3,100 sq ft. That figure assumes open space; brick, concrete and floors reduce it, and a large or multi-storey home is usually better served by a mesh system than by one router.
Rated for 250 connected devices — a marketing figure, but a useful indication of whether a home full of smart plugs, cameras and phones is within its design.
Known limitations
5 specifications are not published by the manufacturer and are shown as Unknown rather than guessed.
Support and updates
GL.iNet's online Flint 4 user guide covers setup over each connection type, including the SFP+ port, and explains every Admin Panel page. Logs export from the Log page for GL.iNet's technical support team, and remote access runs through GoodCloud or AstroWarp.
Sources and verification
Where the specifications come from
- Official product pagegl-inet.com
- Datasheet or manualstatic.gl-inet.com
- Support and firmware documentationdl.gl-inet.com
Verification
- First published
- Specifications last checked
- Sheet completeness
- 23 of 28 specifications verified; the rest show as Unknown and are never estimated or scored
- Page type
- Product specification page — Compiled from the manufacturer’s published specifications and the cited sources; this is not a hands-on test.
- Basis
- Research-based: specifications and editorial text were compiled from the documents listed here and the manufacturer’s published data. We have not tested this unit ourselves; where independent measurements are mentioned they belong to the linked publication.
Wi-Fi Routers with similar specs to the GL.iNet Flint 4 (GL-BE14000)
Ratings & reviews
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The bottom line
The GL.iNet Flint 4 (GL-BE14000) earns a VS Score of 72, above the median of the 26 wi-fi routers it is measured against (a score of 50 is level with that median).
- Who it’s for
- A homelab or small office with a 10G switch, NAS or fiber line that wants one OpenWrt router for multi-gig routing, VLANs and a fast VPN, with spare 2.5G ports for everything else.
- Who should look elsewhere
- Anyone without 10G hardware or plans for it, and anyone who wants to add mesh nodes now, since GL.iNet lists router, access point, extender and WDS modes for this model and no mesh mode.
- The trade-off that matters
- You pay for 10G before you own anything that uses it. Until you do, the Flint 3's all-2.5G back panel does the same daily job in a smaller box.
- The main alternative
- TP-Link Archer BE900: two 10G ports, one of them an SFP+ combo, plus a quad-band radio and TP-Link's app, for buyers who want the fast wired side without OpenWrt.
The VS Score is calculated from the weighted specifications above, each measured against the median of comparable wi-fi routers — a shortlisting guide, not a substitute for your own priorities. See how we score.
