Making Sense of Wi-Fi 6: More Than Just a New Naming System
The new Wi-Fi will be called Wi-Fi 6 and routers with this technology will be available from 2019.
The next Wi-Fi standard will be available via routers in 2019, but the bigger news is it will be called Wi-Fi 6. The Wi-Fi Alliance, which is responsible for making decisions on the connectivity and its standards, has decided to name Wi-Fi standards differently from now on.
Till date, Wi-Fi standards were denoted by 802.1.ac and few more. Soon these devices will show Wi-Fi names with numbers like Wi-Fi 5 for the current standard, which is 802.1.ac.
What you’ll see next year is 802.1.ax, which will be called Wi-Fi 6. The new names will appear on the router with symbols (given below) helping buyers understand what each router is capable of.
This is what the new names of the standard look like. The list includes existing as well as upcoming Wi-Fi technology. The changes on routers will reflect in the coming months.
What Will I Get?
Now that we know what it’s called, it’s time to look at what the upcoming Wi-Fi 6 connectivity standard will offer for consumers buying routers with this technology.
Mostly, you’re looking at a smart home-friendly ecosystem that’ll deliver better performance for small devices like smart lights and every other connected device.
According to Wi-Fi Alliance, people can expect the signal strength to cater to demands of multiple devices in a household, which is ideal for the Netflix-hogging generation. Now we wait for the router makers to incorporate these changes into the products and launch them in 2019.
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