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Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

xda-developers.com

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Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#11

Post by gib444 »

LoganDark wrote: post #9
trvz wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You used the wrong units there. Should be Mbps and Gbps.

I did not use the wrong units, I converted them. The speeds available in my area currently max out at 1.2Gbps which is 150MBps.

The widely-accepted convention is to use bits when discussing line speeds (as the article does).

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#12

Post by LoganDark »

BlackRabbit1 wrote: post #6
Reason077 wrote: post #4

Oh no. I haven't even upgraded to WiFi 7 yet!

You are not missing too much. One of the core features (MLO) is currently mostly scam. APs/Clients negotiate the protocol (and it shows up in the status) but doesn't it to either increase robustness or bandwidth (by combining/switching between two frequency bands). Also the driver quality is a huge mess. (We tested it using the latest generation Cisco Enterprise gear but also with Prosumer stuff like Ubiquiti or TP-L…

It sounds like you're talking about throughput aggregation, which indeed no device currently supports. Not even Apple's most recent devices have any sign of it, except that M5 Pro/Max MacBook Pro models are tested for simultaneous transmission on 2.4+5GHz and 2.4+6GHz: https://mrncciew.com/2026/03/17/macbook-pro-m5-wi-fi-7-missi...

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#13

Post by avhception »

LoganDark wrote: post #5
Reason077 wrote: post #4

Oh no. I haven't even upgraded to WiFi 7 yet!

I have a Wi-Fi 7 AP and this confused some members of my family that didn't even know it went higher than 6. I thought it was pretty funny

My family doesn't know that the WiFi AP is not the DECT base. They understand when I tell them, but that's gone after a week. They use the words WiFi (or, as we say in Germany, WLAN) and "Internet" almost interchangeably. At work, too. "Internet kaputt" can mean anything from "my device is broken" to "our ERP app is not doing the right thing / responding too slow".

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#14

Post by Gigachad »

LoganDark wrote: post #2

Makes sense since a lot of networks don't have access to speed. The highest speeds in my area are around 150MBps, so 5-6GBps or whatever is a perfectly fine upper bound for me. Range and congestion however has been an issue.

You can still make use of more. Local video streaming from your PC to tv, file transfers between nearby devices etc.

Modern wifi is fast enough that using cables is often not required.

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#16

Post by riobard »

LoganDark wrote: post #9
trvz wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You used the wrong units there. Should be Mbps and Gbps.

I did not use the wrong units, I converted them. The speeds available in my area currently max out at 1.2Gbps which is 150MBps.

When talking about network bandwidth, it is custom to measure in bit-per-second therefore the "bps" notation. If you convert to bytes, it is highly recommended to use "b/s" notation instead, i.e 150MB/s, to avoid confusion.

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#17

Post by tveyben »

LoganDark wrote: post #9
trvz wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You used the wrong units there. Should be Mbps and Gbps.

I did not use the wrong units, I converted them. The speeds available in my area currently max out at 1.2Gbps which is 150MBps.

But IIRC the de facto unit for network transmission speeds are bits - not bytes - pr second, and when it’s more the rule than the exception than people write ‘B’ in stead of ‘b’ then the confusion gets even higher..

I would expect this crowd here to not make these mistakes as ofte. :-)

B is defacto for storage…

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#18

Post by greenavocado »

BlackRabbit1 wrote: post #6
Reason077 wrote: post #4

Oh no. I haven't even upgraded to WiFi 7 yet!

You are not missing too much. One of the core features (MLO) is currently mostly scam. APs/Clients negotiate the protocol (and it shows up in the status) but doesn't it to either increase robustness or bandwidth (by combining/switching between two frequency bands). Also the driver quality is a huge mess. (We tested it using the latest generation Cisco Enterprise gear but also with Prosumer stuff like Ubiquiti or TP-L…

> infrastructure-controlled roaming

802.11 r/k/v exists

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#19

Post by PhilipRoman »

riobard wrote: post #15

> with Wi-Fi 7 reaching a maximum theoretical throughput of 23Gbit per band Note to tech reports: do not EVER quote this metric as it is the most useless piece of information.

"per band" is also hilarious, as if you could get that kind of data rate in 2.4GHz

Re: Wi-Fi 8 is the first wireless upgrade in years that isn't chasing speed

#20

Post by Reason077 »

LoganDark wrote: post #2

Makes sense since a lot of networks don't have access to speed. The highest speeds in my area are around 150MBps, so 5-6GBps or whatever is a perfectly fine upper bound for me. Range and congestion however has been an issue.

It's nice to have the fastest Wi-Fi possible even if your upstream internet is slower. Sometimes you want to transfer files locally between devices, or run backups etc. Faster Wi-Fi here can make a huge difference to those tasks.
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