---
title: "Best 2.5GbE and 10GbE Switch for a Homelab (2026)"
description: "The best homelab switch in 2026 is the TP-Link TL-SG108S-M2 at $59.99. When to add a 10GbE SFP+ uplink, which cables matter, and how to prove the link with iperf3."
date: 2026-09-21
categories: ["self-hosting"]
tags: ["2-5gbe","10gbe","homelab"]
---
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Buy the [TP-Link TL-SG108S-M2](/go/tp-link-tl-sg108s-m2/). Eight 2.5GbE ports, fanless, metal, $59.99 on September 21, 2026 (list price $129.99), sold by Amazon, 4.8 stars from 545 ratings. Most homelabs have one NAS, one server, a desktop, and an access point. Eight ports covers that with two left over. Step up only when something in the rack actually speaks 10GbE.
Some links below are Amazon affiliate links, including `/go/` redirects that land on Amazon. Buying through them pays me a small commission at no extra cost to you. Prices were checked on September 21, 2026 and move constantly, so confirm them on the product page.
## Quick picks
| Switch | Price (Sep 21, 2026) | Ports | Managed? | Buy it for |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [TP-Link TL-SG105S-M2](/go/tp-link-tl-sg105s-m2/) | $39.99 | 5x 2.5GbE | No | A desk, or the far end of the house. |
| [TP-Link TL-SG108S-M2](/go/tp-link-tl-sg108s-m2/) | $59.99 | 8x 2.5GbE | No | The default. |
| [UGREEN 6-port](/go/ugreen-2-5gbe-switch/) | $49.99 | 5x 2.5GbE + 1x 10G SFP+ | A mode button, not a real switch OS | One 10GbE uplink to the NAS or server. |
| [NETGEAR MS308](/go/netgear-ms308/) | $109.99 | 8x 2.5GbE | No | You want the NETGEAR label and will pay double. |
| [GigaPlus 18-port](/go/gigaplus-gp-s25-1602/) | $189.99 | 16x 2.5GbE + 2x 10G SFP+ | No | A rack that grew past eight devices. |
If the [Proxmox host](/best-mini-pc-proxmox/) has SFP+ and the [NAS](/best-nas-homelab-docker-proxmox/) has 10GbE, those two should meet on SFP+, not on a 2.5GbE port in the middle. Everything else can sit on 2.5GbE and never notice.
## Count the ports, then the power
Write the devices down before you add a switch to the cart. A typical small lab is: router, NAS, Proxmox host, desktop, access point, printer. That is six, and the SG108's eight ports leave two spares. Add a second server, a NVR, and another AP and you are shopping for sixteen ports whether you wanted to or not. Buy two spare ports on purpose. The Sunday you need one is the Sunday the 5-port was the wrong economy.
Then mark which of those devices need Power over Ethernet. An access point or a PoE camera plugged into the SG108 still needs an injector or a PoE switch. The default pick on this page does not power anything. If two or more devices want PoE, skip ahead to that section and buy that switch instead of "the 2.5GbE switch plus a handful of injectors."
The wattage of the switch itself is not the decision. TP-Link's spec for the SG108S-M2 is 9.11W max, from a 12V 1A adapter, in a 6.2 by 4.0 by 1.0 inch metal case. ServeTheHome measured 1.6W idle and 2.0W with one 2.5GbE link up ([their review](https://www.servethehome.com/tp-link-tl-sg108s-m2-8-port-2-5gbe-switch-review/2/)). Even at the 9.11W ceiling, a month at $0.16 per kWh is about a dollar. Fanless also means silent. Pick the switch for ports and for whether you trust the brand, not for the power bill.
## What 2.5GbE is for
A 1GbE link tops out near 110 MB/s. A single modern hard drive can do that. Two drives in a mirror, or one NVMe, cannot. 2.5GbE is about 280 MB/s, which is enough for a 4-bay NAS of spinning disks and for a [mini PC](/best-mini-pc-home-server/) that is not moving VM images all day. 10GbE is about 1.1 GB/s, which is the number you want when Proxmox storage, backups, or a photo library live on the NAS and you are the impatient person waiting.
You do not need a 10GbE port on every run to a laptop. You need it on the two machines that talk to each other the most. That is why the interesting cheap switches this year are not "all ports 10GBase-T." They are 2.5GbE desks with one or two SFP+ cages.
TP-Link's own bullet for the SG108S-M2 says you can stay on existing Cat5e for 2.5GbE. That matches how these PHYs were designed: 2.5GBASE-T was built to run on Cat5e at the usual 100 meter channel, and in practice short in-house Cat5e is fine. 10GBase-T is the picky one. Use Cat6 for short 10GbE copper runs and Cat6a if the cable is long or bundled with a dozen others. If both ends are SFP+, skip copper. A DAC for anything in the same rack, fiber if the run leaves the rack. 10GBase-T modules run hot, draw more power, and many cheap switches are grumpy if you fill every cage with one.
## 1. TP-Link TL-SG108S-M2
**$59.99**, list $129.99 · 4.8 stars from 545 ratings · sold by Amazon · fanless metal
Eight ports, each of which will link at 100Mb, 1Gb, or 2.5Gb. No login page and no VLAN database. TP-Link's own spec sheet still gives it loop prevention, 802.1p/DSCP QoS, and IGMP snooping, which matters if you have cameras flooding multicast. The switching capacity is 40 Gbps, which is exactly eight 2.5GbE ports at full duplex, so this little box is not oversubscribed. The MAC table is 4K entries. A house will not fill that. A giant lab of [containers](/docker-containers-home-server/) all bridging onto one flat network might. Jumbo frames go to 12KB, which you should leave alone until the section below.
TP-Link says you can stay on Cat5e. I believe that part. Prove the speed anyway, because a single 1GbE dongle in the path silently ruins the upgrade. The test is further down.
The 5-port TL-SG105S-M2 is the same idea at $39.99, 4.6 stars from 746 ratings, also sold by Amazon. Buy the 5-port when the devices are a mini PC, a NAS, and an access point, and you are done. Buy the 8-port the moment you own a printer, a second server, or a spare port you will be glad exists on a Sunday.
## 2. UGREEN: the $50 switch with one 10GbE port
**$49.99** · 4.5 stars from 307 ratings · 5x 2.5GbE + 1x 10G SFP+
This is the switch I would add when the NAS or the Proxmox box has an SFP+ port and everything else is 2.5GbE. The SFP+ cage takes a 1G, 2.5G, or 10G module, optical or RJ45. The module is not in the box. Budget a DAC or a transceiver, or the 10GbE port is a hole.
The front button is the part people misunderstand. UGREEN documents three modes:
- Standard. A normal switch.
- Link aggregation. Ports 4 and 5 become a group, which they rate at 5Gbps combined. Useful if the NAS has two 2.5GbE ports and supports LACP. Both ends have to be configured. The button alone does not teach your NAS anything. A single file copy still rides one link. The second gigabit shows up when several clients talk at once, not when you drag one folder.
- VLAN. Ports 1 through 4 cannot talk to each other. They can talk to ports 5 and 6. That is port isolation, the pattern people use so guests cannot see each other but can see the router. It is not an 802.1Q VLAN database. You cannot trunk VLAN 10 and VLAN 20 through this box and have them come out tagged on a hypervisor.
Link lights: green means 2.5GbE, yellow means some other speed. If you paid for 2.5GbE and the light is yellow, stop and check the cable and the NIC before you blame the switch.
## 3. NETGEAR MS308: the same eight ports, more money
**$109.99**, list $199.99 in search results the same day · 4.8 stars from 197 ratings · fanless · 802.3az
Eight 2.5GbE ports, unmanaged, fanless, happy on Cat5e or Cat6. NETGEAR's copy is the usual "Wi-Fi 6 access points and gaming PCs" paragraph. Electrically this is the SG108S-M2's job at almost twice the price.
Buy it if you have been burned by no-name switches and want a brand whose RMA process you already know, or if it drops under the TP-Link during a sale. Do not buy it because you think it is managed. It is not. There is no firmware screen hiding a VLAN page.
## 4. GigaPlus: sixteen 2.5GbE ports and two SFP+
**$189.99** · 4.3 stars from 586 ratings · fanless · unmanaged · 16x 2.5GBase-T + 2x 10G SFP+
GigaPlus rates the backplane at 120 Gbit/s, which is the right order of magnitude for 16x 2.5GbE plus 2x 10GbE full duplex (16 times 5 plus 2 times 20 is 120). The Amazon bullets were in French the day I read them. The hardware description is still clear: sixteen multi-gig copper ports, two SFP+ cages, metal case, fanless, plug in and walk away.
This is the switch for the lab that used to be "a NAS and a mini PC" and is now also three APs, a NVR, a desktop, a second server, and a pile of IoT bridges you refuse to put on Wi-Fi. The two SFP+ ports are the uplinks. One to the NAS, one to the Proxmox host, copper for everyone else.
The caveats are the brand and the lack of a management UI. 4.3 from 586 reviews is a large sample and not a perfect one. Read the recent one-star reviews for dead-on-arrival units before you click, the same as you would for any white-box switch. You cannot mirror a port, you cannot see an error counter, and you cannot tag a VLAN.
r/HomeNetworking has already had this argument. In a thread comparing GigaPlus, YuanLey, and NICGIGA, the useful replies were not about which logo is faster. They are the same class of switch, a couple of watts apart, and people who bought the 8-port outgrew it ([the thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/HomeNetworking/comments/1qujyt8/trying_to_decide_what_switch_to_buy_for_25gb/)). One owner of a NICGIGA managed 8-port said it is fine until the power drops, and then you get to type the config in again. That is the trap with cheap managed switches. Unmanaged forgets nothing, because it stores nothing. A managed switch that forgets its VLANs every time the [UPS](/best-ups-for-home-server/) transfers is worse than a dumb switch and a router that holds the VLANs.
The same thread points at ServeTheHome's cheap 2.5GbE roundup if you want someone who has actually metered a pile of these ([the roundup](https://www.servethehome.com/the-ultimate-cheap-2-5gbe-switch-mega-round-up-buyers-guide-qnap-netgear-hasivo-mokerlink-trendnet-zyxel-tp-link/)). And one reply I agree with: if the next switch is in another room, a 10GBase-T uplink is easier to extend than an SFP cage. DAC wins inside the rack. Copper wins when the run is a wall you do not want to pull fiber through. The module will run warm. Budget for that, or stay on DAC and keep the machines together.
If you already run a UniFi controller, that is when the Flex 2.5G PoE below earns its price. The thin unreviewed "Ubiquiti" listings that are not the Flex are still not worth a link.
## If something needs PoE
An unmanaged 2.5GbE switch does not power an access point. Three ways out, in the order I would try them.
**One AP.** Buy a PoE injector and keep the SG108. An injector is cheaper and dumber than replacing the switch, and the data path stays on the switch you already trust.
**A few APs or cameras, and you want a known brand.** The [TP-Link TL-SG105PP-M2](/go/tp-link-tl-sg105pp-m2/) was $125 (list $169.99) with 4.5 stars from 77 ratings. Five 2.5GbE ports, four of them PoE++ up to 60W each, 123W total budget, fanless, and a recovery button that reboots a dead camera. Only two were left, and the seller was Technology Traders rather than Amazon. Read the return line. Five ports also means this is a PoE edge switch, not the core of a growing lab.
**Eight PoE ports and a 10GbE uplink, white-box price.** The [YuanLey 8x 2.5GbE PoE plus two 10G SFP](/go/yuanley-8-port-2-5g-poe/) was $99.98, 4.3 stars from 808 ratings, 802.3af/at, 120W budget. That review count is large enough to take seriously, and the brand is still a white box. Same rule as the GigaPlus: read this month's one-star reviews for dead ports before you trust it with cameras.
**You already run UniFi, or you want a real controller.** The [Ubiquiti Flex 2.5G PoE](/go/ubiquiti-flex-2-5g-poe/) (USW-Flex-2.5G-8-PoE) was $199, 4.6 stars from 134 ratings. Eight 2.5GbE PoE++ ports and a 10GbE RJ45/SFP+ combo uplink. The PoE budget depends on how you feed it: Ubiquiti's listing says 196W with the optional AC adapter, and only 16W, 46W, or 76W if you power the switch itself from upstream PoE. Buy the AC adapter or the access points brown out. The interesting VLAN and port screens live in the UniFi controller. Without that controller it is an expensive dumb switch.
## The cable that makes the SFP+ port real
A cage without a module is a hole. In the same rack, buy a passive DAC, not a pair of RJ45 transceivers. The [10Gtek 1m SFP+ DAC](/go/10gtek-sfp-dac-1m/) was $14.99, 4.7 stars from 314 ratings, and it is the one I would put between a Proxmox host and this switch. One meter is the right length when the machines are on the same shelf. Passive copper gets unhappy as it gets long. If the NAS is in another room, use fiber and a pair of modules, and accept that those modules cost more than the DAC and run warmer.
10GBase-T modules in particular run hot. A switch that is fine with two DACs can throttle or error when every cage has a copper module in it. Do not fill a cheap SFP+ switch with RJ45 modules and then blame the NAS.
## Prove the speed
Install iperf3 on both ends. On the NAS or the server:
```bash
iperf3 -s
```
On the other machine:
```bash
iperf3 -c 192.168.1.10 -t 20
iperf3 -c 192.168.1.10 -t 20 -R
```
Read the Gbit/s line, not the feelings. Roughly:
| Link you think you bought | iperf3 result that means you got it |
| --- | --- |
| 1GbE | 0.94 Gbit/s |
| 2.5GbE | 2.3 to 2.35 Gbit/s |
| 10GbE | 9.3 to 9.4 Gbit/s |
If the number is a clean step below (2.5GbE gear showing 0.94), something in the path negotiated down. Walk the LEDs. On the UGREEN, yellow is the tell. On a NIC, `ethtool` shows the actual speed. Bad crimps, a leftover 1GbE switch, and a USB Ethernet dongle from 2016 are the usual villains. Cat5e is rarely the villain at 2.5GbE across a house.
Run it for twenty seconds at least. A two-second test fits in a buffer and lies.
Jumbo frames are optional and usually a waste of an evening. Every NIC, the switch, and the NAS have to agree. Leave the MTU at 1500 until a specific protocol's documentation tells you otherwise. The UGREEN's "12K jumbo frames" bullet is a capability, not a recommendation.
## Where the VLANs live
An unmanaged switch forwards frames. Most of them forward VLAN-tagged frames without understanding them, which means you can trunk from an OPNsense box to a Proxmox bridge through a dumb switch and have it work. Test it. A few cheap switches strip tags.
What a dumb switch cannot do is terminate those VLANs onto different physical ports with a policy. The UGREEN's VLAN mode is a fixed isolation trick, useful for "these four ports should not see each other." Real per-VLAN rules belong on the router. If you want a switch UI, buy a managed switch on purpose and do not expect the SG108 to grow one in a firmware update. It will not.
No. TP-Link and NETGEAR both say Cat5e is enough for these 2.5GbE ports. Spend the recabling money on the one or two runs that are actually 10GbE.
Yes. Each port negotiates on its own. The 1GbE printer does not slow the NAS. It only slows traffic that has to pass through that printer's link, which it should not.
Only if the other end is also 10GbE. A 10GbE switch in front of a 2.5GbE NIC does nothing. Check the [mini PC](/best-mini-pc-proxmox/) and the NAS first, then buy the uplink.
## What I would buy
SG108S-M2 on the desk, $60, plus a 1m DAC if either the NAS or the server has SFP+. UGREEN instead of the SG108 when there is only one SFP+ device and I want that uplink in the same small box. GigaPlus once the device count is past eight, after I read this month's reviews. A PoE switch only when an AP or a camera is on the list. I would not pay $110 for the MS308 unless the TP-Link was out of stock.