Attainable user throughput by dense Wi-Fi deployment at 5 GHz

Most of currently deployed Wi-Fi networks use the IEEE 802.11b/g standard and operate in 2.4 GHz ISMband. As mobile traffic demand rapidly increases, significant Wi-Fi deployment in the still very lightly used 5 GHz band is anticipated. In combination with the recent PHY amendments, e.g., 802.11ac, such Wi-Fi in many settings emerges as a strong competitor to small cellular deployment. In this paper, we aim to quantify what total capacity and which data rates per user can be supported by high-density, the state-of-the-art 5 GHz Wi-Fi deployment. Unlike previous studies, we consider the effect of densification by explicitly modeling the different level of interference among access points for office-type scenarios with various internal wall losses. Although abundant spectrum availability at 5 GHz may compensate for system inefficiency caused by carrier sensing and contention, we find that there is a capacity limit. This capacity limit depends on propagation environments and is especially low in “open” environments or environments with low wall losses. To operate at capacities above this limit, cellular systems with their more advanced interference mitigation techniques are required.