Various embodiments are described for potentially reducing the impact of routing area updates on wireless system capacity. Logic flow diagram 10, in FIG. 1, depicts such functionality. In some embodiments, it is determined (12) whether a remote unit is within an edge portion of a routing area, while in other embodiments it is determined (12) whether the remote unit is within an end portion of a routing area update interval. It is also determined (14) whether one or more conditions are present for the remote unit to perform a resource-efficient routing update. A routing area update is then performed (16) when one or more of the conditions are present and when, depending on the embodiment, either the remote unit is determined to be within the edge portion of the routing area or the remote unit is determined to be within the end portion of the routing area update interval.