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Chatting on WeChat, browsing Weibo, watching videos… surfing the internet on a mobile phone has become an important part of our lives.On March 5, Premier Li Keqiang proposed in the government work report to abolish the “roaming” fees for data, and to reduce mobile network data charges by at least 30% within the year, which received a round of applause.
Speaking of this data issue, many people must first ask if there is Wi-Fi available when going out to save data.
But have you noticed what the wireless network is called in your phone settings?
Some say that iPhones are called Wi-Fi, while Android phones are called WLAN. In fact, regardless of whether you use an iPhone or an Android phone, or even the same model of phone, there are cases where some are called Wi-Fi and others are called WLAN.
WLAN and Wi-Fi are often confused,
what are the differences between the two?
WLAN: is the general term for Wireless Local Area Networks. For networks, it is a type of network mode; for phones, it is a function, similar to a computer’s wireless network card. Its role is to use Radio Frequency (RF) technology for data transmission, achieving communication and resource sharing in a network system.
Wi-Fi: stands for Wireless Fidelity. In simple terms, Wi-Fi is a type of short-range wireless communication technology. There are many ways to set up a wireless local area network, and many different data transmission standards can be used. Wi-Fi is one of those standards, in short, Wi-Fi is a subset of WLAN. Wi-Fi is included in WLAN and is a technology within the WLAN protocol.
So, the two actually have an inclusion relationship! Wi-Fi’s coverage radius can reach 90 meters, while WLAN’s radio wave coverage is broader, with a maximum range of up to 5 kilometers when an antenna is added. Therefore, in daily life, Wi-Fi is usually generated by routers, wireless network cards, or wireless APs, mainly used in smaller areas like homes and offices, while WLAN is typically used in broader areas, such as schools, airports, and other public places. On mobile phones, regardless of whether it is an iPhone or an Android phone, whether the wireless network in the settings is called Wi-Fi or WLAN, it is currently connected to WLAN through Wi-Fi, and the effect is the same.
Then why are there different names for the same model of phone?
Since we are talking about this issue, we must mention the wireless local area network protocol with independent intellectual property rights that China began implementing in 2003—WAPI. WAPI stands for Wireless Local Area Network Authentication and Privacy Infrastructure, which is a security protocol and also a mandatory standard for wireless local area network security in China. Compared to Wi-Fi, WAPI has better security, but it has not yet been promoted internationally.
According to regulations from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of China: any mobile phone sold in mainland China (also known as national version) must support both Wi-Fi and WAPI technologies to access WLAN networks, and phones that only support Wi-Fi cannot be sold. Since China requires all national version devices to support both WAPI and Wi-Fi protocols, it is inaccurate to call the function in system settings Wi-Fi, so this function in national version phones is collectively referred to as wireless local area network or WLAN. Non-national versions, commonly known as water goods, only support Wi-Fi, so they are referred to as Wi-Fi in the settings.
Now you finally understand!
Content source: Science Popularization China, Mobile Professor WeChat account
