Apple iPhone 17 Series Features In-House Developed N1 Chip: Wi-Fi 7 Bandwidth Still Limited to 160 MHz

On September 14, it was reported that Apple’s new iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and iPhone Air are all equipped with the company’s in-house developed N1 chip, supporting Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread connectivity.

However, MacRumors discovered that the N1 chip has some limitations on the maximum channel bandwidth for Wi-Fi 7. FCC filings reveal that the N1 chip in all the new iPhones only supports a 160 MHz Wi-Fi 7 bandwidth, rather than the standard 320 MHz specification.

Additionally, according to Apple’s description, Wi-Fi 6E is unavailable in mainland China. Although Wi-Fi 7 is supported, the 6 GHz band is not available in the region.

This means that the devices cannot achieve the theoretical peak speeds of Wi-Fi 7. However, it's important to note that in actual use, network performance is often constrained by carrier services and other conditions, so this limitation may have a minimal impact on most users.

IT Home found that the iPhone 16 series (excluding iPhone 16e) released last year was the first to support Wi-Fi 7, with the bandwidth similarly capped at 160 MHz.

However, the iPhone 16 series used Broadcom chips, so some users were hoping that the in-house developed N1 chip in the iPhone 17 series would allow the bandwidth to reach 320 MHz, but unfortunately, that was not realized.