Banana Pi R3 Mini: 5G Router Guide & Hardware Resources

Banana Pi Router design BPI-R3/R3 Mini(MT7986)
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Setting up the Banana Pi R3 Mini as a 5G router with the Quectel RM520N-GL turned out to be a lot more complicated than expected—firmware quirks, modem power issues, fan noise, and case limitations all got in the way. After a lot of trial and error (and help from others in the community), I put together a guide to hopefully make this process easier for anyone else.

I decided to document my journey, which covers hardware assembly, ImmortalWRT installation, Wi-Fi band steering, package setup, fan control, and recovery (still work in progress). There’s also a 3D-printable STL for a Noctua A6x25 (60mm) fan lid, with notes on materials and assembly.

This project builds on solutions and ideas from:

Full guide and repo:

This is still work in progress (with some sections missing), and I’m happy to accept issues in the repo or pull requests.

Hopefully this helpful overall.

2 Likes
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Thanks for this usefull guide!

one question about:

OpenWRT (as of July 2025) does not offer reliable support for the Banana Pi R3 Mini and should be avoided. GitHub - def324/bananapi-r3-mini-guide

Could you explain why exactly?

I’m happy with the official OpenWRT 24.10.2 on my BPi-R3 Mini. Everything I use it for, is working fine. Is this because of the 5G module?

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I can’t remember exactly what didn’t work for me, but I think I had issues at the flashing stage already. This could have certainly been a mistake from my end.

Are you able to test it from your end with a 5G module? Happy to adjsut the guide and mention that OpenWRT should work as well. Let me know your thoughts.

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Sorry, but I have no 5G module to test. Maybe in a few years, when they are affordable.

Flashing the BPI-R3 mini to OpenWRT shouldn’t be a problem at all. The device is supported officially. There are people having active RM520N modules on OpenWRT and it does not look like there are any issues to activate it since the drivers are added to the kernel. I have read about heat and power problems, but this should be a general thing with the R3 mini.

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Thanks, I appreciate the feedback. I’ll change the wording in the guide to say while everything was tested on immortalWRT, openWRT will likely work as well.