Wi-Fi Alliance
This story is part of CES, where our editors will present the latest news and the hottest gadgets from CES 2021 entirely virtual.
The Wi-Fi Alliance has launched its Wi-Fi 6E certification program for devices equipped to transmit signals in the newly opened 6 GHz band, the industry group announced on Thursday. Change arrives just in time for CES 2021, and sets the stage for a flurry of new, next-generation devices capable of accessing a large range of additional bandwidth at the fastest speeds that Wi-Fi is capable of today.
These speeds come through Wi-Fi 6, which started to be implemented as the best and latest version of Wi-Fi in 2019. Wi-Fi 6E is based on this standard without completely replacing it, adding access to the 6 GHz band, which the FCC opened for non-use licensed in a unanimous vote last year.
With enough spectrum to accommodate seven 160 MHz channels at the same time, this 6 GHz band is much broader than the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands that most Wi-Fi users are already familiar with – and without any previous generation device slowing things down, it will act as a sort of exclusive superhighway for devices equipped to take advantage of.
“Wi-Fi 6E will have rapid adoption in 2021, with more than 338 million devices entering the market and almost 20 percent of all shipments of Wi-Fi 6 devices supporting 6 GHz by 2022,” said Phil Solis , research director at IDC. “This year, we expect to see new Wi-Fi 6E chipsets from various companies and a variety of new Wi-Fi 6E smartphones, PCs and laptops in the first quarter of 2021, followed by TVs and VR product announcements in the middle of the year.”
With standards for Wi-Fi 6E now incorporated into Wi-Fi Certified 6, the Wi-Fi Alliance hopes to encourage this process by ensuring that new 6E devices remain secure and fully interoperable, regardless of region or manufacturer.
“Consumers believe that if you buy a Wi-Fi device, it will connect to your router,” said Kevin Robinson, a spokesman for the Wi-Fi Alliance. “The reason for this is Wi-Fi Certified. The industry places a lot of value on getting devices to pass these tests so that the ultimate experience is that everything works together.”
In addition to interoperability, Wi-Fi Certified focuses on standardizing security protocols. For example, with Wi-Fi 6E, devices will be required to support the latest protocol, WPA3, which promises better defense against brute force password attempts on your network, among other improvements.
“It is an opportunity to break the legacy requirements of the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands,” said Robinson. “In the 6 GHz band, WPA3 is the only option.”
Industry members of the Wi-Fi Alliance – many of whom are presenting their own Wi-Fi 6E devices at CES this year – praised on the go, with some calling it an important milestone not just for Wi-Fi 6, but for Wi- Fi in general.
“The Wi-Fi Alliance’s certification programs are essential to ensure trust around the interoperability of the Wi-Fi device,” said Eric McLaughlin, VP of the Client Computing Group at Intel Corporation; GM, Wireless Solutions Group. “The new Wi-Fi 6E capability represents one of the most important advances in recent wireless history and is critical to help meet the growing demand for capacity, broadband access and new uses.”
You can expect to see a steady stream of names jumping in the Wi-Fi 6E movement to meet this demand in 2021. One of the first, when it comes to phones, is likely to be Samsung. The Korean conglomerate was one of the first to adopt Wi-Fi 6 with its Galaxy S10 lineup, and will also be one of the first to adopt Wi-Fi 6E.
“As a leading innovator in mobile experiences, we were one of the first to offer Wi-Fi 6 certified products,” said JM Choi, vice president and head of the Convergence R&D Group at Samsung Electronics. “[We] we are looking forward to introducing new Galaxy devices capable of taking advantage of the increased speeds, reduced latency and expanded bandwidth that comes with connecting frequencies in the 6 GHz band soon. “