FCC Unanimously Votes to Open Unlicensed 6 GHz Wi-Fi Band

The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved unlicensed use of the 6GHz spectrum, allowing more companies and devices to expand their reach into the new broadband frequency.

One problem with the current Wi-Fi generations, and all those that came before, is that they tend to get crowded as more devices arrive on the market and into households. Multiple devices using the same frequency ranges will eventually slow the communication down or create interference. Expansion of the Wi-Fi ranges was inevitable.

Wi-Fi 6 usage is nothing new, but the recent FCC resolution targets the unlicensed use of the 6GHz spectrum, which means that it was already being used, in limited cases. Now, everyone can join in and release hardware that operates in this spectrum without needing permission from the FCC.

In all, the older bands, 2.4GHZ and 5GHz, have been in use for almost two decades, which makes for a very crowded market. As soon as the new frequencies reach the wider population, the load on older devices should ease considerably. Furthermore, the new provisions are expected to contribute to offloading some of the cellular network’s burden for providing Internet access.

“It is estimated that, in the U.S. alone, almost 76 percent of all mobile data traffic will be offloaded to Wi-Fi by 2022, that the amount of offloaded traffic will increase more than seven-fold between 2017 and 2022, that the total number of public Wi-Fi hotspots will increase by 300 percent during this same time period, and that almost 50 percent of total IP traffic will be Wi-Fi within the next two years,” said FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly.

FCC’s vote was unanimous, showing a lack of contention between commissioners. It looks like the industry’s efforts to get this past the commission, with research studies, didn’t go to waste.

Customers should see the first Wi-Fi 6 devices that make use of this new spectrum as early as the end of 2020.