Apple's latest MacBook Air and Mac Studio models, featuring the M4 chip, surprisingly lack support for the latest Wi-Fi 7 standard, opting instead for Wi-Fi 6e. This decision has prompted investigations and analyses.
Experts suggest the limited benefits of upgrading from Wi-Fi 6e to Wi-Fi 7 for consumers. Wi-Fi 6e already offers access to less congested 6 GHz frequencies. The lack of official ratification of Wi-Fi 7 by the IEEE consortium also plays a role.
The omission of Wi-Fi 7 highlights the balance between technological advancement and the tangible benefits for users. While Wi-Fi 7 may offer future improvements, Wi-Fi 6e currently addresses many needs.
Apple has not only improved the latest Macs with M4 CPUs technologically but also in terms of other standards: The Macbook Air and Mac Studio now support Bluetooth 5.3.
The Mac Studio also has four Thunderbolt 5 connections, allowing data transfer rates of up to 120 Gb/s.
The two newest devices do not support Wi-Fi 7, the latest wireless data transfer technology.
The Macbook Air M4 and Mac Studio M4 (and M3 Ultra) only support Wi-Fi 6e.
Last year, experts investigated why the latest iPads and Macs with the M4 processor do not include Wi-Fi 7, although iPhones with A18 do.
One probable explanation is that upgrading from Wi-Fi 6 to Wi-Fi 6e benefits end customers far more than migrating from Wi-Fi 6e to Wi-Fi 7.
Wi-Fi 6e already provides access to the 6 GHz frequencies, which are not yet “occupied” and do not require authorization to transmit from weather stations or other radars in the neighborhood.
Furthermore, the IEEE consortium has yet to officially ratify Wi-Fi 7.
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