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arXiv · 2610.07900

IEEE 802.11bx - WLAN Intelligent Networking (WIN): Toward an AI-Ready Wi-Fi 9

Francesc Wilhelmi·Katarzyna Kosek-Szott·Szymon Szott·Boris Bellalta
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Abstract

Wi-Fi 9 is expected to go beyond mere communication and provide new services such as sensing or computation. At this juncture, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is taking a leading role in the definition of the 802.11bx amendment, named WLAN Intelligent Networking (WIN). In this tutorial, we survey the recent progress made toward Wi-Fi 9 within IEEE 802.11 standardization, tracing the drivers and technological advances that motivate an AI-ready Wi-Fi 9. We then examine AI's role along three complementary dimensions, i.e., AI as a protocol (AI is applied to Wi-Fi's PHY/MAC operation), AI as a platform (Wi-Fi infrastructure is repurposed to provide AI computation), and AI as traffic (AI flows call for new traffic-handling policies), and discuss candidate features and open challenges along each. As a concrete illustration of the AI as traffic paradigm, we present a case study on AI traffic differentiation, where we explore a potential extension of the current Enhanced Distributed Channel Access (EDCA) to support new AI traffic flows.

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Francesc Wilhelmi, Katarzyna Kosek-Szott, Szymon Szott, Boris Bellalta. 2026-10-06. IEEE 802.11bx - WLAN Intelligent Networking (WIN): Toward an AI-Ready Wi-Fi 9. https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.07900

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