Ubiquiti introduces Unifi wifi 6 Lite and Unifi 6 Long Range series for business wifi network, so does TP-link with its Omada series. Which reliable business class AP products between Ubiquiti wifi 6 and Omada wifi 6 you prefer to support your corporate wifi networks?
In this article:
- Unifi Wifi 6 AP Series
- Unifi 6 Lite vs LR
- Ubiquiti Unifi Wifi 6 vs Omada
- Omada
- Unifi 6 Lite vs Omada eap620
- Unifi 6 LR vs Omada eap660
Unifi Wifi 6 AP Series
After nearly a year after Engenius released the wifi 6 AP series, finally Ubiquiti released two wifi 6 access point series, Unifi 6 Lite and Unifi 6 LR. Likewise, TP-link finally released two wifi 6 AP series, the Omada eap620 and Omada eap660.
And today you can see more unifi and omada series have come including wifi 6e access point. So far, Ubiquiti introduces various models of new unifi 6 models in addition of the first model unifi 6 lite and lr series.
Here are Ubiquiti Unifi 6 series available in the market:
- Unifi 6 lite
- Unifi 6 lr
- Unifi u6 professional
- Unifi u6 enterprise
- Unifi u6 mesh
We’ll discuss the first two products unifi 6 lite and unifi 6 lr and compare them with the first two models offered by tplink with its omada series. Will these two vendors get success with their new wifi 6 access point products following the successful of their previous wifi 5 based products?
Unifi 6 Lite vs LR
There were two series of wifi 6 AP introduced by Ubiquiti – the Unifi 6 Lite series and Unifi 6 Long Range series wifi-6 access point before new models were introduced. What is the difference between these two product series? Take a look at the following table 1 that shows you spec comparison table for Unifi 6 Lite and LR series.
Network segment
Technically the most visible difference is the difference in the wifi network segment each of the product series where the Lite series works @ ax1500 while the LR series works @ ax3000 network segment which of course is different in network performance, total bandwidth each series can deliver and number of connected devices.
Table 1 Ubiquiti Unifi Wifi 6 series differences
| Model | Unifi 6 Lite series | Unifi 6 Long Range U6-LR |
| Wifi technology | Simultaneous dual band ax1500 wifi-6 access point with 2×2 MU-MIMO and OFDMA | Simultaneous dual band ax3000 wifi-6 access point with 4×4 MU-MIMO and OFDMA |
| Wifi speeds | Up to 300Mbps @2.4GHz Up to 1,200Mbps @5GHz | Up to 600Mbps @2.4GHz with 4×4 MIMO Up to 2.400Mbps @5GHz 4×4 MU-MIMO |
| Antennas | 2.8dBi @2.4GHz 3.0dBi @5GHz | 4dBi @2.4GHz 5.5dBi @5GHz |
| Ethernet | 1x Gigabit Ethernet Port | 1x Gigabit Ethernet Port |
| Processor | 880 MHz MIPS 1004 KEc with 256 MB memory | Dual-Core® Cortex® A53 at 1.35 GHz with 512MB |
| Price in Amazon (Aug 2021) | $185.00 | $519.00 |
UniFi Network Controller
What distinguishes the AP business products offered by Ubiquiti in these two Unifi wifi 6 series and also other UniFi series compared to home-based AP products is the network management. Its a kind of management capability to facilitate hosting, configuring and monitoring all connected devices to the network centrally using a mobile interface with Unifi network controller software and mobile app.
You can host the software locally hosting in a PC or you can host on the cloud and you can manage centrally all the APs spread all over the remote sites within the enterprise network.
Ubiquiti Unifi Wifi 6 vs Omada
Before comparing the technical hardware between these two AP series (Omada series and Unifi series), you should first know the network management model offered by these two vendors. In general both offer almost the same network management model.
Network management
Omada provides two options in managing these eap APs that you need to select according to size of your business network.
- Controller mode – large scale business network, local sites or multiple sites locally or remotely
- Standalone mode – small business / homes
With standalone mode, of course you will manage each eap device one by one with each using its own management page using Omada app. To manage them easier you need to provide a static IP address on each of eap device at the same network segment as your laptop. Open from your web browser by using the IP address applied to each eap.
Of course this doesn’t matter if the number of eaps in your business is only a few, what if the number of them you have to manage is hundreds or even thousands spread from local sites to dozens of branch offices / business units across cities or across continents? For that you need to select the controller mode option.
With controller mode you can use the Omada controller software, or the Omada hardware controller. With software of course you need a host / server to run this omada controller software. Or you can use the Omada hardware controller that has all the Omada network management stuffs installed on the machine, no computer needed but large monitor.
With Omada controller software installed, you can manage up to 1,500 Omada APs, JetStream switches and routers. While with Omada hardware controller you can manage up to 100 devices. Both Omada software and hardware can be cloud access.
What about Ubiquiti Unifi wifi 6 products, how the management module is to use?
Like Omada, Unifi also uses similar Unifi controller software that you can install on a computer with Windows, Unix, or Mac. The following picture is a diagram of how you install Unifi controller software on a PC either on the same local network segment or you can install it on a cloud that can be accessed remotely.
For multiple remote sites, you may install the controller software on the cloud.
Now, let’s compare these Unifi wifi 6 Lite series and Unifi LR series with their competing products introduced by TP-link – the Omada wifi 6 series AP products.
Omada
TP-link introduced couple of AP products with wifi 6 technology at the first time, the lower version model Omada eap620 and the high end model Omada eap660 wifi-6 access point. Both are targeted for High density (HD) environment based on wifi-6 technology, and the lower version model is based on wifi-5 technology (the Omada eap265 AC1750Mbps AP).
Omada eap620 is based on ax1800 wifi-6 while the higher bandwidth model is based on ax3600 wifi-6 technology. It is therefore Unifi 6 Lite is comparable with Omada eap620 and the spec comparison table between the two models is shown in table 2 below.
Omada eap660 is the high end version with ax3600 network segment and is comparable with Unifi 6 Long range series; please refer to table-3 that shows you spec comparison between Unifi-6 LR model with Omada eap660 series.
And today you can find few other omada wifi 6 series introduced to the market including the latest wifi 6e access point. We’ll focus on the first two products introduced for the first time with wifi 6 technology.
Unifi 6 Lite vs Omada eap620
See that the apparent technical difference is the wifi speed @2.4GHz band where Omada delivers twice as high speed as Unifi 6 Lite. The other main difference is the Ethernet port; see that Omada eap620 offers 2.5Gbps port as opposed to only 1Gbps on Unifi.
Table 2 Unifi 6 Lite vs Omada
| Model | Unifi 6 Lite | Omada eap620 |
| Wifi technology | Simultaneous dual band ax1500 wifi-6 access point with 2×2 MU-MIMO and OFDMA | Simultaneous dual band ax1800 wifi-6 access point with 2×2 MU-MIMO and OFDMA |
| Wifi speeds | Up to 300Mbps @2.4GHz Up to 1,200Mbps @5GHz | Up to 600Mbps @2.4GHz Up to 1,200Mbps @5GHz |
| Antennas | 2.8dBi @2.4GHz 3.0dBi @5GHz | Omni directional internal antennas • 2.4 GHz: 2x 4 dBi • 5 GHz: 2x 5 dBi |
| Ethernet | 1x Gigabit Ethernet Port | One 2.5G Ethernet port for multi-Giga wired network connectivity |
| POE | 802.3af PoE, Passive PoE (48V) | 1x Gigabit Ethernet (RJ-45) Port (supports IEEE802.3at PoE) |
| Processor | 880 MHz MIPS 1004 KEc with 256 MB memory | Unspecified |
| SSIDs | 8x SSIDs / radio band | 8 SSIDs each band (16 SSIDs) |
| Security | WPA-PSK, WPA-Enterprise (WPA/WPA2/WPA3*) | WPA2-Personal/Enterprise, WPA3-Personal/Enterprise |
| Network management | UniFi Network Controller Software / app | Omada app with Omada software controller or Omada hardware controller Support multi-site management |
| Dimension | Ø160 x 32.65 mm (Ø6.3 x 1.3″) | 9.6 x 9.6 x 2.5 in / (243 x 243 x 64 mm) |
| Price in Amazon (Aug 2021) | $185.00 | $129.99 |
See that unifi wifi 6 lite series is tagged with slightly higher price than omada. Listed prices here could be different with the current price, click the link below to see current price and more description in Amazon (#ads).
Unifi 6 LR vs Omada eap660
Table 3 below shows you spec comparison table between Unifi 6 LR and Omada eap660. See that the wifi speed @2.4GHz band is again different; Unifi 6 LR delivers up to 600Mbps while Omada eap660 series delivers up to 1200Mbps.
The Ethernet port is also different where Omada offers higher speed up to 2.5Gbps as opposed to only up to 1Gbps offered by Unifi LR model. All the wifi speeds each devices are the same deliver up to 2.4Gbps @5GHz radio band with 4×4 MU-MIMO.
Table 3 Unifi Wifi 6 vs Omada
| Model | Unifi 6 Long Range | Omada eap660 |
| Wifi technology | Simultaneous dual band ax3000 wifi-6 access point with 4×4 MU-MIMO and OFDMA | Simultaneous dual band ax3600 wifi-6 access point with 4×4 MU-MIMO and OFDMA with 8 spatial streams |
| Wifi speeds | Up to 600Mbps @2.4GHz with 4×4 MIMO Up to 2.400Mbps @5GHz 4×4 MU-MIMO | 1148Mbps @2.4GHz 2402Mbps @5GHz |
| Antennas | 4dBi @2.4GHz 5.5dBi @5GHz | 2.4 GHz: 4x 4 dBi 5 GHz: 4x 5 dBi |
| Ethernet | 1x Gigabit Ethernet Port | One 2.5Gigabit Ethernet port |
| POE | PoE+, Passive PoE (48V) | POE 802.3at / 12VDC Power consumption 21.5W |
| Processor | Dual-Core® Cortex® A53 at 1.35 GHz with 512 MB | Unspecified |
| SSIDs | 8x SSIDs / radio band | 8 SSIDs each band (16 SSIDs) |
| Security | WPA-PSK, WPA-Enterprise (WPA/WPA2/WPA3*) | WPA2-Personal/Enterprise, WPA3-Personal/Enterprise |
| Network management | UniFi Network Controller Software / app | Omada app with Omada software controller or Omada hardware controller Support multi-site management |
| Dimension | Ø220 x 48 mm (Ø8.66 x 1.89″) | 9.6 x 9.6 x 2.5 inch / (243 x 243 x 64 mm) |
| Price in Amazon (Aug 2021) | $519.00 | $179.99 |
Either unifi wifi 6 series or omada eap series come with easy to use network management software for easy deployment and mange connected devices either locally or remotely.
Click the link below to shop the products in Amazon (#ads). Current prices may be different with the listed above.
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