The development of the Wi-Fi 8 standard, so far known as IEEE 802.11bn Ultra High Reliability, will take at least a few more years, but tentative details are already known about the future technology. At the same time, Wi-Fi 7, although it is considered as an “up-to-date version” of Wi-Fi, has not yet been ratified.
However, this does not stop experts from developing the future of Wi-Fi 8. In particular, Taiwanese chipmaker MediaTek, which deals not only with smartphone chips, but also with wireless technology issues, talked about what can be expected from Wi-Fi 8, specifying that the final details will become known only after passing the final specification of the standard, which is expected to take place in the fall of 2028.
While 802.11be, which was commercialized as Wi-Fi 7 and featured “extremely high bandwidth,” 802.11bn, which is expected to be adopted as Wi-Fi 8, is focused on “ultra-high reliability.”
Wi-Fi 8 will reportedly provide approximately the same wireless bandwidth as Wi-Fi 7, with the same channels and the same modulation. Like previous Wi-Fi standards, the new Wi-Fi 8 will be backward compatible with all of its predecessors.
However, Wi-Fi 8 will change how client devices such as computers or mobile devices will interact with multiple access points, and will also offer the following features:
- Coordination of multiple access points
- Further optimization of spectral efficiency
- Extended range
- Improving energy efficiency
MediaTek sees several opportunities to improve coordination between access points and devices within a Wi-Fi network. Moreover, we are talking specifically about MediaTek, as there is still no complete certainty that these proposals will be accepted and implemented by the Wi-Fi 8 standard development working group.