Why You Need WiFi 6
Did you know that your internet speeds can be directly affected by WiFi performance? You could be paying for 54Mbps of speed, but if you have the wrong router, you could be capped at just 20 Mbps. The previous versions of WiFi had much slower speeds, but the newest WiFi 6, has incredible upload and download speed capabilities.
The Wi-Fi Alliance handles the implementation of Wi-Fi technology. They recently created a much simpler naming convention for the different versions of WiFi:
| Version | Previous Name | Year | Through Put Speeds |
| Wi-Fi 1 | 802.11b | 1999 | 11 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 2 | 802.11a | 1999 | 54 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 3 | 802.11g | 2003 | 54 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 4 | 802.11n | 2009 | 600 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 5 | 802.11ac | 2014 | 3.5 Gbps |
| Wi-Fi 6 | 802.11ax | 2021 | 9.6 Gbps |
Now that you can easily decipher the different versions, let’s talk about the upgrades given to WiFi 6 and why they work best for the modern home.
1. Support for Busy Multi-device Households
A key feature of the new WiFi 6 is that it increases overall network efficiency to allow several devices with various bandwidth requirements to connect to your WiFi. This is especially important for work from home employees that may be on zoom meetings while downloading large files, kids doing school work online, streaming shows on their tablets or gaming.
It also offers less bandwidth congestion than what you get with Wi-Fi 5 technology, providing greater client capacity, and reducing overall client power consumption.
2. Ideal for Smart Homes that Need More Bandwidth
Do you have Smart Home devices? WiFi connected devices in the average home are growing from an average of 10 devices, to as many as 50 or more. Each WiFi-connected lightbulb, smart switch, door lock, appliance, or camera is a load on your WiFi network. Wifi 6 is designed to be able to handle an increase in devices without negatively impacting your WiFi speeds because it handles network traffic more efficiently than previous iterations.
Wi-Fi 6 also uses Target Wake Time (TWT), which allows devices to determine when they will normally wake up to begin sending and receiving data. This extends the battery life of mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, as well as battery-powered smart home devices such as security cameras and video doorbells.
3. Speed
WiFi 6 has a maximum speed more than twice as fast as WiFi 5, with throughput speeds of up to 9 Gbps. That doesn’t mean you will experience 9 Gbps, but you can enjoy significantly faster speeds than on a WiFi 5 network. In addition, you’ll experience far less latency which improves your upload speeds for gaming and video conferencing.
Latency is the time between a user action and the response from the website or application to this action – or in gaming, it’s the delay that could cost you a win. If you’re frustrated with latency, a WiFi 6 router has almost no latency and coupled with fiber broadband internet will you give you a high-quality connection.
4. Streaming Seamlessly
Many newer Smart TVs are already available in ultra-high-definition 4K or 8k technology. In order to get the best picture quality possible, you will need a reliable high-speed connection. Since they are equipped with extremely fast processors, additional memory and an increased number of radio streams, WiFi 6 routers are up to the task of streaming multiple high definition video sessions without buffering so you can enjoy your shows, sports games and movies with out interruption.
Although WiFi 6 routers are backward-compatible with previous-generation WiFi devices, they won’t be able to utilize WiFi 6 without WiFi 6 compatibility. What’s even better is that for IQ Fiber customers, a brand new WiFi 6 routers is included and there’s no equipment fees. Want IQ Fiber in your neighborhood? Sign up at IQFiber.com.