Why no Wifi6? Any technical limitations?

[meduk1]

I presumed with the latest 10th gen chips WIFI 6 would come as standard, but it doesn't look that way from yesterdays update.

Is there any technical limitation preventing rollout out WIFI 6 in the latest 13 and 16 MBP or is it just a sales choice?

I was planning on upgrading my home router to WIFI 6 to compliment a new iPhone and MBP, but it seems unlikely that this years will include the update.

 

[ascender]

I’m guessing its just a roadmap choice on Apple’s part and this will come in the next proper redesign which is slated for next year. Presumably priority one was to swap the keyboard out along with a spec bump at minimal cost.

Given all the rumours about ARM and redesigns, I can see their logic, whether I necessarily agree with it!

 

[maflynn]

Is there any technical limitation preventing rollout out WIFI 6

Of course not, if there was a technical issue, then we'd not see other makers rolling out wifi 6 based laptops. Its a business decision pure and simple.

 

[mattopotamus]

I would understand holding off if it was a decision across all product lines, but the new iPad/iPhones have wifi 6. I really am confused at the decision.

 

[clangers23]

It's probably because Intel are going to integrate WIFI 6 & Thunderbolt? Has that been completed yet? I'm assuming that's what Apple are waiting for?

Apple are notorious for holding back features to future releases particularly mid and late life products.

 

[Howard2k]

It results in a compromise. It's a little difficult to illustrate because the vendors don't tend to be too forthcoming about their wifi capabilities for some reason. Maybe it's just because the general public don't really understand wifi? I'm not sure.

Right now the current MacBook Pros (aside from the low end 13", and I'm assuming the 2020 has the same limitation) are 802.11ac with a 3x3 antenna deployment. This means that with the appropriately spec'd home 802.11ac router you can get up to 1.3Gb/s of bandwidth. On the lower end Pro (and the Air) that has a 2x2 antenna setup, so will top out around 867Mb/s of bandwidth.

The new Dell XPS 13" has 802.11ax with a 2x2 deployment, though most of the ones I've seen are 1x1. The achievable speeds will depend on the further specifics of the deployment, and that's even harder to find, but I'm speculating that a 2x2 Wifi 6 machine should be able to hit between 1.2Gb/s to 2.4Gb/s. Or with 1x1 between 600Mb/s to 1.2Gb/s.

So assuming that wifi matters to you (and it probably does if you're reading this comment) and you have a MBPro right now running a 3x3 802.11ac deployment at up to 1.3Gb/s, then if you replace your MBPro with an XPS 13" but you don't replace your home wifi router as well ($), then you're going to see a decrease in wifi performance by upgrading your notebook, because the XPS would drop you from a potential of 1.3Gb/s (Pro) to 867Gb/s (XPS).

To be clear - the MBPro on a Wifi5 802.11ac network with a 3x3 deployment is 50% faster than a brand new XPS 13" with Wifi6 802.11ax running on an 802.11ac network.

Older notebook. 50% faster wifi.

Unless you also spend more money upgrading your wifi router too. And even if you do replace your wifi 5 setup with a wifi 6 setup, if it's a 1x1 Wifi 6 deployment it will likely be slower. A 2x2 wifi 6 deployment will be comparable or better, again as long as you replace your router.

If Apple was to roll out Wifi 6 on the new MBPro with a 3x3 deployment - problem solved. But I haven't seen any notebooks with a wifi 6 deployment in 3x3.

So perhaps it's a bit of a balancing act. Apple upgrades now to Wifi 6 in a 2x2 deployment and they will strand some existing users who will have to accept a reduced Wifi 5 performance, or will have to also spend money to replace their router. They may not want to see the complaints from people who feel they're being "railroaded" into buying a new laptop and ALSO having to shell out for a new router in order to not take a wifi performance hit. Total speculation on my part though. But look at the complaining about the migration from USB-A to USB-C, that didn't go down spectacularly well.

(There are other benefits of Wifi 6 too (such as MU MIMO), but those tend to favour large numbers of clients with lower bandwidths, vs a smaller number of clients with higher bandwidth requirements.)

 

[clangers23]

So perhaps it's a bit of a balancing act. Apple upgrades now to Wifi 6 in a 2x2 deployment and they will strand some existing users who will have to accept a reduced Wifi 5 performance, or will have to also spend money to replace their router. They may not want to see the complaints from people who feel they're being "railroaded" into buying a new laptop and ALSO having to shell out for a new router in order to not take a wifi performance hit. Total speculation on my part though. But look at the complaining about the migration from USB-A to USB-C, that didn't go down spectacularly well.

(There are other benefits of Wifi 6 too (such as MU MIMO), but those tend to favour large numbers of clients with lower bandwidths, vs a smaller number of clients with higher bandwidth requirements.)

Thanks for the post, that answers a question. I have a MBP 16" and an XPS 15" 7590 with WIFI 6. I also have a WIFI 6 router and yet I'm seeing very little difference between either laptop across both public/internal routes. I'd expected the XPS to be faster internally.

 

[leman]

It’s as Howard2k says in his extremely detailed post. WiFi 6.0 is still relatively new and the available chips do not offer much practical advantage over the high-end 3x3 setups Apple has been offering in their Pro lineup.

Basically, unless you are sitting a meter away from your WiFi-6 router, you won’t get any practical advantage from current WiFi-6 equipped models. In a usual home/office setup a 3x3 WiFi-5 MBP will be at least as fast.

 

[holiday786]

I have a MacBook Pro 2012 classic and Dell Xps 13 7390 edition with WiFi 6. I prefer dell compared with apple due to customer service and also you can configure them at a later date. However Dell and Apple are always competing as they always upgrade their devices when new hardware comes out and stop making the previous editions very quickly.

 

[meduk1]

Thanks. Very good explanation of the reasoning. Is the reasoning for it being on other devices including the new SE phone due to the lower end setup i.e. not using 3X3 then?

 

[leman]

Thanks. Very good explanation of the reasoning. Is the reasoning for it being on other devices including the new SE phone due to the lower end setup i.e. not using 3X3 then?

Exactly. Phones don't have the fastest WiFi connectivity to begin with, and they are a great platform to experiment with new tech since people upgrade often.

 

[Michael Scrip]

Isn't WIFI 6 still in the "nice to have" category rather than the "must have" category?

As others have stated... you'll also need a WIFI 6 router which are kinda pricey now. And because it's so new... there are different types of hardware configurations and antenna setups.

I'm not sure I'd want to invest in WIFI 6 right now anyway.

I know there are a tons of comments saying "ZOMG Apple why didn't you put WIFI 6 in xyz product?!?!"

Is there any particular thing people want from WIFI 6? Is there some specific problem that WIFI 6 will solve? Or is it just people wanting the newest thing all the time?

I have an Eero mesh router system (WIFI 5) and zero WIFI 6 devices.

But I've never said "gosh... my life would be so much better if I had all WIFI 6 stuff"

 

[deeddawg]

Is there any particular thing people want from WIFI 6? Is there some specific problem that WIFI 6 will solve? Or is it just people wanting the newest thing all the time?

Yeah, I'm still trying to figure out what the deal is with the "OMG No wifi6 I'm not buying it!" folks.

What particular problem are they experiencing with wifi5 that they expect wifi6 to solve?

 

[meduk1]

For me i wouldn’t say its a problem i’m trying to solve, however I’m in a position where my i will likely need to replace my main router this year due to recent problems with my current AC setup and a general need for some more range.

Like MacBooks, this isn’t something i want to upgrade that often, perhaps every 5 years or so therefore i’m considering getting a WiFi 6 device given a lot of the current lineup are now officially certified therefore no need for further hardware changes. If that’s the case I’ve got 1 eye on devices that are also WiFi 6. Not a must have requirement at all though i agree.

 

[deeddawg]

@meduk1 I agree it's certainly a forward-looking nice-to-have - just not seeing why it's the make-or-break item for some folks on whether they buy a new MBP or not. Though perhaps being one who tends to buy when I need to vs. just for the heck of it, maybe I have a different perspective.

 

[esphil]

Isn't WIFI 6 still in the "nice to have" category rather than the "must have" category?

As others have stated... you'll also need a WIFI 6 router which are kinda pricey now. And because it's so new... there are different types of hardware configurations and antenna setups.

I'm not sure I'd want to invest in WIFI 6 right now anyway.

I know there are a tons of comments saying "ZOMG Apple why didn't you put WIFI 6 in xyz product?!?!"

Is there any particular thing people want from WIFI 6? Is there some specific problem that WIFI 6 will solve? Or is it just people wanting the newest thing all the time?

I have an Eero mesh router system (WIFI 5) and zero WIFI 6 devices.

But I've never said "gosh... my life would be so much better if I had all WIFI 6 stuff"

I don't understand what the big fascination with wifi 6 is, people get caught up in the hype. I have a amplifi mesh network in my house for the past year that works perfectly. Its one of the best and most reliable setups I've used. I have no speed or signal issues, what more do I need?

 

[Bolanders]

I don't understand what the big fascination with wifi 6 is, people get caught up in the hype. I have a amplifi mesh network in my house for the past year that works perfectly. Its one of the best and most reliable setups I've used. I have no speed or signal issues, what more do I need?

I have the same setup. Amplifi HD with 3 additional Mesh antennas plugged in throughout the house. Works flawlessly.

 

[leman]

I don't understand what the big fascination with wifi 6 is, people get caught up in the hype.

Well, I would certainly appreciate faster WiFi. I have a gigabit internet connection(which also performs very close to what is advertised) and I routinely transfer large amount of data from the work data servers, so having a 1+GB reliable WiFi would be great. However, with todays consumer WiFi-6 won't deliver this kind of performance. I am sure in a year or two we will be there, but not yet.

The people complain about lack of WiFi-6 because they look at the marketing instead of looking at the facts. But that is the case with everything, isn't it?

 

[nordique]

I presumed with the latest 10th gen chips WIFI 6 would come as standard, but it doesn't look that way from yesterdays update.

Is there any technical limitation preventing rollout out WIFI 6 in the latest 13 and 16 MBP or is it just a sales choice?

I was planning on upgrading my home router to WIFI 6 to compliment a new iPhone and MBP, but it seems unlikely that this years will include the update.

No technical limitation
As others have mentioned, purely a business decision.

If WiFi6 is part of your future, I think you can still go ahead and order the new router and have your system set up - you will just have to wait for Apple to introduce it into their laptops.

There were some rumours that a 16" refresh is due this year, so perhaps at that time we will see WiFi6?

 

[waquzy]

Apple just being Apple again. Simple as that

 

[nordique]

Well, I would certainly appreciate faster WiFi. I have a gigabit internet connection(which also performs very close to what is advertised) and I routinely transfer large amount of data from the work data servers, so having a 1+GB reliable WiFi would be great. However, with todays consumer WiFi-6 won't deliver this kind of performance. I am sure in a year or two we will be there, but not yet.

The people complain about lack of WiFi-6 because they look at the marketing instead of looking at the facts. But that is the case with everything, isn't it?

I overall agree as there is no need to have it today or now, but I would say for majority of people out there, they are not upgrading their laptops every 2 years - but then you do have consumers like the OP here who is genuinely interested in upgrading to WiFi 6 for their own reasons.

And, there is something to be said with future proofing for those kinds of products.

For example, my late 2013 rMBP was Apple's first 13" MBP that was upgraded to 802.11 ac (now known as WiFi 5), and this was not something that was common place back then but it is now. Because my laptop was future proofed, I get to enjoy the benefits of WiFi 5/802.11ac without needing to purchase a new laptop today.

It's a small thing, and your point still stands because most personal households, vendors, businesses and coffee shops had not upgraded to WiFi 5 in 2013, though now it is common place now and it is handy when I lug this laptop around (and ac was a very nice WiFi upgrade over b/g/n)

 

[leman]

For example, my late 2013 rMBP was Apple's first 13" MBP that was upgraded to 802.11 ac (now known as WiFi 5), and this was not something that was common place back then but it is now. Because my laptop was future proofed, I get to enjoy the benefits of WiFi 5/802.11ac without needing to purchase a new laptop today.

It's a small thing, and your point still stands because most personal households, vendors, businesses and coffee shops had not upgraded to WiFi 5 in 2013, though now it is common place now and it is handy when I lug this laptop around (and ac was a very nice WiFi upgrade over b/g/n)

That is not what I meant though. My point is that current WiFi-6 laptop, with a very fast WiFi-6 router, will barely give you any advantage over a 3x3 WiFi-5 setup in a MBP with a fast WiFi-5 router, unless you are literally sitting in front of your WiFi-6 router. Look at the benchmarks out there: yes, you do get a 2Gbps connection on a Dell XPS — if you are within 1 m of a router. Make it 6 meters and it falls down to a trickle. At the same time I am getting steady 800Mbps on my 16" MBP WiFi-6 sitting 5 meters away from my living room WiFi point. And there are no faster WiFi-6 laptop solutions currently on the market.

The tech is just too new. It will take some time to mature.