Intel Wi-Fi 6: A New Level of Wi-Fi Performance
Eric McLaughlin,
Vice President of Client Computing Group;
General Manager of Wireless Solutions Division.
Wi-Fi 6: The Path to Superior Connectivity
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Wi-Fi 6 is the most significant advancement in connectivity in more than a decade, providing a critical solution to the growing data and bandwidth demands of more devices . Wi-Fi 6E recently launched and started shipping in PCs from our partners. |
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Intel’s Wireless Solutions Group is innovating in laptops to maximize the benefits of Wi-Fi 6 and working with the broader ecosystem to enable a better end-to-end experience. |
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Together with 5G, Wi-Fi 6 ushers in a new era of unparalleled connectivity for individuals and families, employees and businesses, and societies and economies. |
We’ve learned to accept certain imperfections in everyday connectivity. We put up with delayed video calls, slow downloads, and endless efforts to speed things up. It’s frustrating, but we find compromises. We lower video quality, wait for streams to buffer, and coordinate family schedules to avoid putting too much stress on Wi-Fi. We accept these inconveniences as inevitable.
But that's not true. They are technology problems, and we are developing technology solutions.
Our mission at Intel is to create technology that delivers the experiences that matter most , and we are optimistic about the future. Because Wi-Fi 6 is here, giving us the tools we need to achieve unmatched connectivity. It’s flawless, without compromise.
Challenges: Data, Demand, and Densification
The root of today’s challenges is the mismatch between our increasingly connected lives and increasingly outdated Wi-Fi architecture.
For years, business and personal demand for data and wireless connectivity on more devices has been steadily increasing. We now work and learn remotely, play games online, stream ultra-high-definition videos, make video calls, and more—all simultaneously on the same crowded (or “dense”) Wi-Fi networks. The COVID-19 pandemic has only accelerated this trend, with global internet traffic increasing by 38% in early 2020, 80% of which was driven by video, social, and gaming. [1]
As the number of Internet users continues to grow, we need faster, more reliable, and lower-latency Wi-Fi to meet these demands —now and in the future. It is estimated that by 2023, there will be 5.3 billion Internet users worldwide [2] , and that more than 60% of mobile traffic will be offloaded to Wi-Fi this year. [3] By then, Wi-Fi will contribute an estimated $3.5 trillion to the global economy—more than the UK’s gross domestic product (GDP).
Yet we’re still relying on Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac), which was introduced in 2013, and which uses the same architecture as Wi-Fi 4 (802.11n), which was introduced in 2007. Not only is the technology outdated, the number of connected devices has exploded. By 2022, 51% of IP traffic will come from Wi-Fi devices, and by 2022, 59% of mobile data will be offloaded to Wi-Fi.
We’ve moved our lives and work online, but most Wi-Fi infrastructure hasn’t kept up. As a result, people and businesses alike struggle with slow speeds, spotty performance, and high latency—common problems with wireless connections.
Our Vision for Wi-Fi 6
We now have a powerful tool to address these challenges: Wi-Fi 6 — the key advancement in wireless connectivity over the past decade.
Intel is working to maximize the benefits of Wi-Fi 6. It solves several fundamental problems. It can split a Wi-Fi network into smaller pieces and better manage many different devices by scheduling data and time, and it can pack more data (20% more) into a data stream. This results in a 4x increase in capacity on dense networks, improved reliability, [4] 75% lower latency, improved responsiveness, [5] and nearly 40% faster speeds.
To get the most out of Wi-Fi 6, we need to innovate and collaborate in the right ways:
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Revolutionizing at the edge. Not all Wi-Fi 6 products are created equal. Intel has developed Intel Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) to support optional, larger 160 MHz channels and can reach Wi-Fi speeds of up to 1,680 Mbps — twice the 840 Mbps of standard 2x2 Wi-Fi 6 80 MHz and nearly 3 times faster than the 600 Mbps of standard 2X2 AC 80 MHz. Intel Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) products, and routers and access points that offer similar capabilities, can also filter out “noise” from other nearby devices and network signals, increasing reliability and improving performance in dense environments. |
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Optimizing networks. Intel’s suite of technologies for laptops and IoT devices enables us to optimize performance on networks like office networks where there are many different Wi-Fi access points and devices. For example, when companies use the Intel vPro platform built for enterprise, we can deliver next-generation WPA3 wireless security with simplified passwords and stronger encryption, faster file sharing and cloud-based applications, and overall improvements in scalability, reliability, security, and performance. |
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Building ecosystem partnerships and setting standards. Intel is collaborating with our OEM partners to optimize Wi-Fi 6 on laptops and IoT devices, and with the broader ecosystem to address system-level challenges. We are working with software companies, hardware vendors, and regulatory and standards organizations such as the FCC, IEEE, Wi-Fi Alliance, and Wireless Broadband Alliance to better define standards and ensure interoperability. |