Various factors influence the selection of shared antenna versus separate antennas for Wi-Fi® and Bluetooth® LE/IEEE 802.15.4 devices in a product.
| Criteria | Shared antenna | Separate antennas | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| Printed Circuit Board (PCB) area | Lower | Higher | Shared antenna products need smaller PCB area. |
| Aggregate throughput | Lower | Higher | Additional opportunities exist for concurrent 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi and Bluetooth LE/IEEE 802.15.4 operation with separate antennas. |
| RF performance | Degraded | Not degraded | Insertion loss due to switch can result in marginal performance loss in Shared Antenna mode. |
| Support for IEEE 802.15.4 standard (Thread®/Zigbee®) | Not supported | Supported | IEEE 802.15.4 standard devices need their RX to be ON all the time. Need to use solution for separate antennas. |