Why you should care about Wi-Fi 7

The Wi-Fi Alliance began certifying Wi-Fi 7 (aka 802.11be) devices last yearOpens a new window and, as a result, something very exciting happened: IT pros got to be the life of every party by explaining why nobody will actually get 46 Gbps speeds on a compatible device. While we all know the theoretical max speeds are mostly marketing material and a way to geek out over the latest tech, Wi-Fi 7 comes with legitimately useful advancements beyond raw transfer speeds

Frankly, we’re still several years away from Wi-Fi 7 becoming a “must have” for many businesses. The majority can get by just fine with Wi-Fi 6/6E (and you can even make an argument for Wi-Fi 5) in the near term. In this post, I’ll break down the benefits of Wi-Fi 7 and how you can assess if you should be a (relatively) early adopter of 802.11be.

A crash course on Wi-Fi 7

Wi-Fi 7, the marketing name for the IEEE 802.11be standard, is the latest Wi-Fi Alliance-approved version of Wi-Fi available today. While the theoretical speeds always grab headlines with new Wi-Fi technology, there is a lot of other cool stuff happening with the latest Wi-Fi standard. Key improvements from Wi-Fi 6/6E included in Wi-Fi 7 are:

• Preamble puncturing (a.k.a. punctured transmission)*: Traditionally, any interference on a given Wi-Fi band would make the remaining spectrum unusable by Wi-Fi devices on the network. Preamble puncturing solves this by carving out the spectrum consumed by the interference and makes the remaining spectrum available for use.
• 320 MHz channels in the 6 GHz band: Wi-Fi 6E brought us the 6 GHz bands with channel sizes up to 160 MHz. Wi-Fi 7 adds 320 MHz channels to the mix, which can meaningfully increase throughput and reduce latency.
• Multi-Link Operation (MLO): MLO is the tech that allows Wi-Fi 7 devices to use multiple different frequency bands (e.g., 2.4, 5, and 6 GHz bands) at the same time. As a result, MLO helps improve connection resiliency, throughput, and latency when both the client and access point support it.
• Multiple Resource Unit (MRU): MRU builds on the latency and throughput improvements Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) brought in Wi-Fi 6 and allows client devices to use multiple, non-contiguous resource units (RUs) and reduce interference losses.
• 4096 Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (4096-QAM): QAM is how Wi-Fi radios translate digital data into analog signals that can be sent over a wireless network. 4096-QAM (a.k.a. 4K-QAM) uses 4096 QAM constellation points and symbols that carry 12 bits, offering a 20% increase in data rate over Wi-Fi 6.

*Technically, preamble puncturing was available in Wi-Fi 6, but it was optional.

Who should adopt Wi-Fi 7 in 2025?

Wi-Fi 7 is faster and performs better in crowded networks (thanks to features like MRU and preamble puncturing), which makes it a genuinely useful solution for many organizations. So, it’s certainly more than just marketing hype, even if there is plenty of that to go around.

Here are five use cases where I think it makes sense for a business to make the switch now:

• You need > 1 gig internet in practice over a wireless connection: ISPs are now offering multi-gigabit internet speeds. While Wi-Fi 5, 6, and 6E offer multi-gig speeds in theory, if you want to consistently achieve greater than 1 Gbps internet connectivity with wireless clients in practice, Wi-Fi 7 is your best bet.
• Very crowded wireless networks: Large apartment complexes, hotels, campuses, office buildings, and event venues currently struggling with wireless connectivity issues related to congestion could benefit from the capacity and efficiency improvements found in Wi-Fi 7 (e.g., MLO, MRU, and 4K-QAM).
• Organizations that want the most future-proof hardware available: We’ve all seen this play out before, the shiny new Wi-Fi standard of today becomes table stakes tomorrow. If you are optimizing for future proofing your wireless in 2025, Wi-Fi 7 is a reasonable investment.
• Very low-latency, high-throughput Wi-Fi use cases: Demanding use cases like virtual reality (VR)/augmented reality (AR) and high-resolution (e.g., 8K) video streaming can benefit from the higher throughput and lower latency Wi-Fi 7 can offer compared to older Wi-Fi standards.
• Enthusiasts and early adopters: I won’t be mad at you if you yell at me for including “enthusiasts” in a section on business decisions, but the truth is that some teams prefer to implement new tech early to stay ahead of the game. If that’s you or your business, Wi-Fi 7 is the current state of the art.

Who shouldn’t adopt Wi-Fi 7 in 2025?

Everyone who wants lower latency, higher throughput, and better future-proofing should theoretically choose Wi-Fi 7. However, before you run out and make a purchase based on my sage Internet commentary, let me remind you of one of the better quotes from the 1800s:

“In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But in practice, there is.” – Benjamin Brewster

Just because the new standard has technical benefits over earlier versions, that doesn’t mean everyone needs to run out and upgrade to IEEE 802.11be  Today. In fact, for many businesses, it probably won’t make sense to take the plunge for quite a while. At a high level, here are three common situations where Wi-Fi 7 upgrades probably shouldn’t be a top business priority:

• Networks with older clients: If your network clients don’t support Wi-Fi 7, upgrading the hardware alone won’t provide the full benefits of Wi-Fi 7.
• Budget-sensitive organizations that can meet network requirements with existing/cheaper Wi-Fi solutions: If your business just needs reasonably fast wireless internet and LAN connectivity, you can typically solve that problem with earlier versions of Wi-Fi.
• Networks that just updated to Wi-Fi 6E: If you’ve upgraded to Wi-Fi 6E in the last couple of years, your wireless networking is likely still relatively modern and meeting business requirements.

Final thoughts: Never let a guy on the internet make your IT purchasing decisions

While I am known for my intelligence and analytical capabilities (in addition to my humility), I am still just some guy on the internet. Hopefully, I’ve been able to help you frame the upgrade decision in a sane, fluff-free way and make an informed decision based on your business context. Let’s talk about it in the community as I’m excited to hear what decisions you’ve made and discussions you’ve had about Wi-Fi 7.