By Claus Hetting, WiFi NOW CEO & Chairman
The drive towards next generation Wi-Fi technology has begun in earnest – but how will you even know that you’re using Wi-Fi 8? Key benefits of the new standard are impressive but they are best demonstrated and experienced under specific conditions, MediaTek says. MediaTek’s Wi-Fi 8 chips have been sampling since October this year with certification targeted for the beginning of 2028, the company says.
The Wi-Fi industry is already off to the races with the first releases of Wi-Fi chipsets and a few demonstrations – but for this new standard, it may not always be obvious when you’re connected with Wi-Fi 8 and when you’re not. In the real-life Wi-Fi 8 networks of the future practical speeds will certainly increase but lab testing and demonstrations will need new ways of showing the benefits since peak PHY data rates for Wi-Fi 8 are unchanged from Wi-Fi 7, MediaTek says.
“We know that Wi-Fi 8 will make AI applications work better because Wi-Fi 8 offers better uplink performance for both range and speed, using Enhanced Long Range (ELR) and Distributed Resource Units (DRU) features. Also, Wi-Fi 8 mesh will be similar to cellular in quality using multi-AP coordination – which is a method also used in 4G – as well as seamless ‘make before break’ roaming. To experience the true benefits of Wi-Fi 8, new demonstrations and tests will need to be created allowing for comparison of current Wi-Fi 7 performance with the much improved Wi-Fi 8,” says James Chen, Vice President of Product & Technology Marketing at MediaTek.
The Wi-Fi 8 standard targets up to 2x higher throughput and 7x reduction in latency under challenging signal conditions, which means Wi-Fi 8 will be faster in more everyday use locations. “In addition to the features above, unequal modulation will deliver higher speeds in varying environments, while more MCS levels will boost speeds at intermediate distances. Finally, Wi-Fi 8 is more energy efficient. All of this will make Wi-Fi 8 perform significantly better than Wi-Fi 7 right across the board in various ways and in pretty much all real-life situations,” he says.
While most of the features can be verified with only one Wi-Fi 8 client and one Wi-Fi 8 AP, some will require additional devices. “To verify the benefits of Wi-Fi 8 mesh, at least two Wi-Fi 8 APs and one client device will be needed. Similarly, to verify the new Wi-Fi 8 features for better energy efficiency called NPCA and DSO, at least one more Wi-Fi 8 client will be needed,” says James Chen.
So when can we expect to see Wi-Fi 8 devices hit the markets? Wi-Fi 8 certification is expected to begin in January of 2028 while the first few client-side devices could be released as early as – for example – during the first quarter of 2028, MediaTek says. The company will be participating in a talk and demonstrating its Wi-Fi 8 technology on January 6-9 at CES in Las Vegas.
Watch this space for detailed coverage from CES Las Vegas 2026.
/Claus.
