The iPhone 15 is not out yet but already the rumours are lining up for the iPhone 16. And, at the top of the list, is an upgrade to wireless comms with Wi-Fi 7. What does Wi-Fi 7 give us and will it be worth the cost of upgrading to a new iPhone?
Wi-Fi 7 will be significantly faster than its predecessors. Peak data rates could hit 46 Gbps – about four times faster than the current generation of Wi-Fi devices which were significantly faster than Wi-Fi 5. By the way, you’ll notice the old way of designating Wi-Fi by its Wi-Fi Alliance designations has been ditched. So, no more remembering the difference between 802.11ac and 802.11ax.
The first widely used Wi-Fi standard was 802.11b, back in the late 1990s. Since then, speeds have increased markedly. And the older standards were retrospectively renamed to make it easier for people to know what they had.
| Name | Standard | Max Data Rate (up to) |
| Wi-Fi 1 | 802.11b | 11 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 2 | 802.11a | 54 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 3 | 802.11g | 54 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 4 | 802.11n | 450 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 5 | 802.11ac | 1300 Mbps |
| Wi-Fi 6 | 802.11ax | 10 Gbps |
| Wi-Fi 7 | 802.be | 46 Gbps |
That faster throughput comes through a few engineering tricks such as doubling the number of simultaneous communications channels for eight to 16. This is referred to as MIMO (multi-user, multiple input, multiple output) which means the time for your device to respond and react to data transmitted over the network is reduced.
There’s also another addition called Multi-Link Operation (MLO) which allows devices to aggregate data movement across multiple channels. The oldest Wi-Fi standards used the 2.4GHz frequency band. Newer standards used both 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequencies but they were more or less kept separate.
Wi-Fi 7 will also use the 6GHz frequency and enable connections across multiple frequency bands to be aggregated. So the link speed of the 5GHz and 6GHz bands, for example, can be combined.
To get all the benefits of Wi-Fi 7, you’ll need to have a compatible router which means a network upgrade. And then there’s the question of the rest of your devices. In other words, it’s a neat update but most of use won’t see the full benefit for some time. And by then, Wi-Fi 8 or later will be with us.
Anthony is the founder of Australian Apple News. He is a long-time Apple user and former editor of Australian Macworld. He has contributed to many technology magazines and newspapers as well as appearing regularly on radio and occasionally on TV.