MAC level Throughput comparison: 802.11ac vs. 802.11n

We compare between the Throughput performance of IEEE 802.11n and IEEE 802.11ac under the same PHY conditions and in the three aggregation schemes that are possible in the MAC layer of the two protocols. We find that for an error-free channel 802.11ac outperforms 802.11n due to its larger frame sizes, except for the case where there is a limit on the number of aggregated packets. In an error-prone channel the bit error rate sometimes determines the optimal frame sizes. Together with the limit on the number of aggregated packets, these two factors limit the advantage of 802.11ac.

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