WI-FI 6: WHAT IS IT AND WHY DO YOU NEED IT?

Wi-Fi 6 is the consumer-friendly name for the latest 802.11ax wireless tech. It’s up to twice as fast as the previous 802.11ac system (now rebranded as Wi-Fi 5) and it’s been designed to share bandwidth better when multiple devices want to communicate at the same time, which means a smoother experience overall.

To get the full benefit of these improvements, you’ll need not only a Wi-Fi 6 router but clients that support the new tech. That includes most laptops and phones produced in the past year, so it won’t be long before Wi-Fi 6 has a significant presence in most people’s homes.

Until then, older devices will still work with a Wi-Fi 6 router. They may even get a performance boost, as many Wi-Fi 6 routers use bandwidth maximising techniques such as highly parallel MU-MIMO and ultrawide 160MHz channels. These features were originally introduced in the 802.11ac Wave 2 standard, but not every Wi-Fi 5 router fully supports them; with a newer model you may well find that