Federal courts have opened the door for what may amount to the most substantial wifi upgrade in over twenty years. From a report: On Tuesday, a U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued a ruling where it supported the FCC’s decision to divvy up 1,200MHz of spectrum in the 6GHz band for unlicensed use, a move that paves the way for the eagerly anticipated move to wifi 6E. Prior to the ruling, wifi was limited to broadcasting over 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands. That new spectrum represents the single largest addition since wifi was first introduced in 1989, the Verge notes. To put that in perspective, prior to the FCC’s additions, wifi operated with just 400MHz of the spectrum. With that in mind, this new ruling should essentially increase the space available to wifi by four times.
When implemented, all this additional spectrum could provide enough capacity to allow seven maximum capacity wifi streams to broadcast in the same areas without interfering with one another, The Verge notes. Put more simply, this should translate to increased bandwidth with less interference for everyday users. Proponents of the FCC’s decision, like agency Chair Jessica Rosenworcel, argue it will provide more wifi access in a greater number of places while simultaneously improving performance. All this extra space could also increase upload and download speeds as well.
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