Wi-Fi Alliance Introduces New Low Power Long Range Technology

The Wi-Fi Alliance comes with Wi-Fi HaLow, which uses an extension of the IEEE 802.11ah technology on, among other things, the 900MHz band. As a result, the maximum range is greater than with ‘normal’ WiFi and less energy is required to maintain the connection.

With this, the alliance comes with a type of WiFi that should be better suited for internet-of-things applications and smart home devices. Wi-Fi HaLow is basically an extension of the 802.11ah protocol. It’s unclear when the first products with HaLow will appear, but The Verge is betting on “sometime in 2018.”

In addition to the 900MHz band, HaLow can also operate in the 2.4 and 5GHz regions. The 900MHz band has the advantage that it is in a frequency range that is not subject to certain restrictions. Also, the penetration power of a 900MHz signal is greater, allowing it to pass through walls and the like better, even with low power consumption. It is not clear from the message on the site of the Wi-Fi Alliance exactly how high that energy consumption is and how the protocol is further structured.

There is currently a lot to do around long distance connections with low energy consumption. With chips for both transmitting and receiving becoming cheaper, the number of possible applications is increasing. Other well-known low power wide area network techniques include LoRa, NWave, OnRamp, Platanus, SigFox, Telensa, Weightless -N and -P. Some of those techniques have a maximum theoretical range of up to several tens of kilometers, such as SigFox and LoRa. The techniques that have the furthest reach generally operate in the sub-gigahertz zone at low to very low data throughputs between 100 bits per second to 500 kilobits per second. The techniques also often make use of the possibility of timing contact moments, which further reduces the energy consumption of the devices.