Wi-Fi 6E: the new kid on the block

The Wi-Fi 6 standard runs in the so-called unlicensed, low-power 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz frequency bands. These bands have been in place since the beginning of this century following quite a long process, as each country has the autonomy to assign band usage within its own territory. In the years running up to 2020, the Wi-Fi industry has worked with about 80 MHz in the 2.4 GHz space and 580 MHz in the 5 GHz space – 660 MHz in total.

There are two possibilities to get more data at higher speeds through the air: more bandwidth (more frequency bands) or more sophisticated radio communication (more megabits per MHz). Over the last 20 years and several generations of Wi-Fi, the data rate has increased by using more advanced radio technologies. The original 11 Mb/s of 802.11b was followed by 802.11a, 802.11g, 802.11n, and so on, with the data rate going up into the multi-gigabits per second. At the same time, the calls grew louder for the governments to provide more unlicensed spectrum.