In the last year, as the COVID-19 pandemic sent many of us home from work and school, access to the internet became crucial for everyone. In our homes and indoors, the way that we most often experience the internet is through Wi-Fi. And last spring, as the world went virtual, the FCC unanimously voted to open the 6 GHz band for unlicensed use. That pivotal vote allowed for Wi-Fi 6E to become the next generation of Wi-Fi that benefits everyone.
Wi-Fi 6E is unique because it accesses a fresh, new band of spectrum that other devices cannot. Charles Cheevers, CTO at CommScope explained that the new technology “will live alongside Wi-Fi’s legacy use of the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands.” Additionally, the new 6 GHz band will act as a “VIP lane” as Cheevers described, making it so devices with Wi-Fi 6E will access the 6 GHz band and relieve congestion in the other bands, which, in turn, will increase speeds in those bands too.
Particularly with the 6 GHz band, it provides an opportunity for innovators to develop and launch services — such as video conferencing, 8K video streaming and even augmented reality and virtual reality services — that require the wide, 160 MHz channels that the band offers. If not for the access to the 6 GHz band, those new technologies could slow down the other, already heavily congested bands.
In the last year we worked, learned, streamed and more all at home and sometimes all at the same time. Our reliance on the internet has never been more obvious than now, and the new 6 GHz band and the technologies that can utilize it, like Wi-Fi 6E, will soon benefit more and more people.