Wi-Fi 6 gets certified, marks new milestone in adoption of a faster wireless standard

Jonny Caldwell

Microsoft, Azure Data Centers

With technologies such as IoT, AR, and even game streaming on the rise, it’s clear that wireless network are going to need to support the low-latency and high-bandwidth requirements that help make them possible. As such, our wireless networks need to be able to handle the heavy load of tasks when such technologies become mainstream especially among multiple users at once, and that’s where the next generation Wi-Fi network comes in.

Wi-Fi 6 was just officially certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance, “bringing advanced capabilities for greater overall Wi-Fi network performance” according to the organization’s official tweet. Samsung’s Galaxy Note 10’s already support the new standard, and Apple’s upcoming iPhone 11 models will support them as well.

Wi-Fi 6 (more technically IEEE 802.11ax) includes a lot more capacity than it’s previous generation counterpart, 802.11ac (more commonly known as Wi-Fi 5), promising up to a 40% boost in maximum data speeds. In addition to bandwidth improvements, Wi-Fi 6 also introduces latency improvements, which could prove very beneficial to adopters of online gaming streaming services such as Project xCloud under development by Microsoft.

While the crazy speeds definitely sound very nice in themselves, it’s unlikely for smaller households to really notice most its improvements. The real benefits come to public networks that are often well overcrowded. Not to sound too technical, but these changes include technologies such as orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) which allows multiple devices to share the same channels, as well as multi-user multiple input multiple output (MU-MIMO) for improving downlink and distributing data between more devices. The organization’s official website has more on the improvements, for those interested.

Are you hyped about the new Wi-Fi 6 standard? What are some ways you’d like to take advantage of its improvements? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments area below.