India opened 6 GHz in January. What it changes for your next Wi-Fi refresh

On 20 January 2026 the Ministry of Communications notified rules exempting the lower 6 GHz band (5925 to 6425 MHz) from licensing for low-power indoor and very-low-power outdoor wireless access systems. That is 500 MHz of spectrum that was previously unavailable, released on a non-interference, non-protection, shared basis.

For most organisations this is not urgent. But if you are refreshing access points in the next twelve months, it changes what you should be buying.

Why it matters more than another band usually would

The practical problem with enterprise Wi-Fi in a dense office has rarely been the standard. It has been congestion: 2.4 GHz is unusable in most business districts, and 5 GHz gets crowded once you have neighbours, which in Gurugram or Noida you invariably do.

500 MHz of clean spectrum allows genuinely wide channels without the usual trade-off between channel width and co-channel interference. That is the thing Wi-Fi 6E and Wi-Fi 7 were designed around, and until January it was not legally available here.

What this should change in a proposal

• Access points. Kit bought this year will be in the ceiling for five to seven years. A tri-band AP that can use 6 GHz costs marginally more than one that cannot, and the difference compounds across the life of the estate.
• Coverage planning. 6 GHz does not travel as far or through walls as well as 5 GHz. A design that simply reuses the existing 5 GHz AP positions will have holes. It needs a fresh survey, not a copy of the old plan.
• Client mix. The benefit only arrives for devices that can use the band. Worth checking what your fleet actually is before anyone specifies for it.
• Indoor, low power. The exemption is specific. It does not cover outdoor high-power links, and it excludes use in vehicles, aircraft below 10,000 feet, drones and oil platforms.

The question to ask

If you have a refresh quote on your desk and it does not mention 6 GHz, ask why. There are legitimate answers: your client devices may not support it, or the budget may favour more 5 GHz radios over fewer tri-band ones. There is no legitimate answer that begins with the supplier not knowing the rules changed.

The wider point: network hardware decisions have a seven-year shadow, and the regulatory position moved this year. Anything specified against 2024's assumptions is specified against the wrong ones.