How to detect Wi-Fi adapter capabilities

Is there an easy way to detect your Wi-Fi adapter's capabilities on Linux? I want to check if my wireless card supports IEEE 802.11ac.

Thomas Nordquist

Posted 2013-11-23T13:47:01.633

Reputation: 433

Answers

The iw list command (with the space in the middle) will show you the adapter capabilities. This includes the modes the wifi card is capable of.

You will need to install the iw package to use that tool.

Lawrence

Posted 2013-11-23T13:47:01.633

Reputation: 3 807

what if your device doesn't show up there? which is weird because wifi is working (R8188EU) – TheAlchemist – 2016-12-01T19:24:33.810

1@TheAlchemist The device may not be using the nl80211 stack, which is what the iw command queries IIRC. – Lawrence – 2016-12-04T16:52:52.127

You can run iwconfig to list all of your wifi cards/adapters, list their IEEE, frequency, connected ESSID etc. in a short and clean format. If you want more specific information feel free to use iw list to see a lot more detailed information.

Some sample output (without being connected to router):

wlan0     IEEE 802.11abgn  ESSID:off/any  
          Mode:Managed  Access Point: Not-Associated   Tx-Power=off   
          Retry  long limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Power Management:off

lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

p1xel

Posted 2013-11-23T13:47:01.633

Reputation: 420