Excess inventory in the channel has been cleared, and WLAN revenue is expected to grow 12% in 2025, according to Dell’Oro Group, which adds that WiFi 7 shipments will shoot up this year – representing more than a third of Indoor AP revenues.
“We expect that in 2028, WiFi 7 sales will represent over 90% of Indoor AP revenues, with the first enterprise class WiFi 8 APs appearing on the market late that year,” says Siân Morgan, research director at Dell’Oro Group. “WiFi 6 never reached that level of penetration because Wi-Fi 6E was released to the market so quickly.
“Industry experts who sit on the key standards bodies are already working through the options for Wi-Fi 8,” says Morgan. “We predict a material upswing in WiFi 8 adoption in 2029, which gives WiFi 7 over five years on the market for vendors to recoup development costs.”
Additional highlights from the Wireless LAN Five-Year July 2025 Forecast Report include:
- Lower WiFi 7 price premiums are expected to boost market adoption of the technology.
- HPE’s acquisition of Juniper may help grow the worldwide Public Cloud-Managed WLAN market.
- Vendor WLAN software revenues are expected to keep growing as annual recurring revenue streams build up.
- Adoption of AI by enterprises is expected to put pressure on the Local Area Network and support spending on WLAN.