Quick answer: If you are planning an SMB upgrade and want a simple rule of thumb, build new permanent links on Cat6a, keep Cat6 where you already have it and it tests clean, and treat Cat7/Cat8 as niche options unless you have a very specific reason to use them.

Why This Choice Matters More Than the Switch Brand

Most upgrade conversations start with active gear: new Wi-Fi 6/6E or Wi-Fi 7 access points, 10G uplinks, maybe moving from flat 1G to a 2.5G/5G access layer. The quiet assumption in the background is that “the cabling will handle it”. That assumption is what comes back to bite projects a year later when links flap, PoE devices reboot under load or a site suddenly discovers that half its runs cannot pass a 10G test.

Cable is the part of the network that is most painful to change once the building is finished. You can swap a switch in an afternoon; you do not want to reopen ceilings and shafts because a few lines on the bill of materials were optimistic. That is why it is worth looking calmly at what Cat6, Cat6a, Cat7 and Cat8 actually mean in practice, not just on a marketing chart.

The Numbers Behind Each Category

Before getting into pros and cons, it helps to line up the headline specs the way an engineer would look at them: usable frequency, target speed, and realistic reach in a structured system. The table below simplifies a lot of detail, but it is enough to guide SMB decisions.

On paper, higher categories always look better: more MHz, more headroom, bigger numbers. But SMB networks do not live on paper. They live in real cable trays, with real installers, in buildings that will be rearranged repeatedly over a decade. In that real world, the question is not “what is the highest category I can afford?” but “which category gives me enough performance without locking me into awkward compromises?”

Cat6 – The Workhorse That Many Sites Already Have

Cat6 is the category you are most likely to inherit in an existing office or school. It is perfectly comfortable at 1G to the desktop over a full 100 metre channel, and it often supports 2.5G or 5G to Wi-Fi access points on the shorter runs you typically see in corridors and classrooms.

The complicated part is 10G. Under ideal conditions — short channels, good patching, tight control of alien crosstalk — Cat6 can run 10G quite happily, which is why you will find so many lab tests and white papers showing “10G over Cat6”. The catch is that real installations do not always look like the lab. Once you bundle many 10G Cat6 channels together, the noise between cables becomes the limiting factor, not just the length.

If you want to dig deeper into how far you can push 10G on Cat6 before alien crosstalk and installation variables take over, the article “Can Cat6 Do 10G? Distance, Alien Crosstalk and Installation Variables” walks through those scenarios in detail.

For SMB upgrades, Cat6 is usually a “keep if you have it, but be careful with expectations” choice. If the cabling is in good condition and passes certification, there is no need to rip it out just because you are upgrading switches. But if you are opening ceilings and pulling new cable anyway, it rarely makes sense to install yet more Cat6 for the next ten years.

Cat6a – The Sensible Default for New Horizontal Cabling

Cat6a exists for one primary reason: to make 10G over copper boring. It doubles the bandwidth of Cat6, is specified all the way to 500 MHz and, more importantly, the standard explicitly deals with alien crosstalk between cables in bundles. In practice, that means a properly installed Cat6a plant will give you 10G to any user or AP in the building without having to micro-manage which channels sit next to which.

The trade-offs are easy to spot. Cat6a cable is thicker than Cat6, especially in shielded designs, and it can be a tighter fit in old conduits and small floor boxes. It is also more expensive per metre. But if you spread that cost over the 10–15 year life of the cabling, it is usually the cheapest way to avoid nasty surprises when you start turning up 10G links and high-power PoE.

If you often install high-density patching or run big bundles through shared pathways, it is worth understanding how Cat6a is tested and designed to control alien crosstalk. The post “Alien Crosstalk Mitigation in Cat6a Cabling” gives a good sense of what happens between cables, not just inside one.

For most SMB and campus projects that expect to use 10G anywhere in the building during the life of the cabling, Cat6a is the category that strikes the best balance between performance, standards support and long-term predictability.

Cat7 – The Category That Looks Better on Paper Than On Site

Cat7 is where the standards story gets messy. It is defined in ISO/IEC standards, but it is not part of the mainstream TIA copper cabling standards used in most RJ45-based enterprise networks. True Cat7 channels are supposed to use non-RJ45 connectors such as GG45 or TERA, with individually shielded pairs and an overall braid.

In other words, a lot of what is sold as “Cat7” patch cords and reels in online marketplaces is not really Cat7 in the standards sense at all — it is usually some flavour of shielded cable terminated on ordinary RJ45 plugs, with a Category number printed on the jacket that looks higher and therefore “better” to a non-specialist buyer.

From an SMB upgrade perspective, that is the core problem with Cat7: you gain very little that Cat6a cannot already give you in a clean, standards-aligned way, but you add confusion around connectors and interoperability. That is why many integrators either stay with Cat6 for modest requirements or move straight to Cat6a for 10G, and simply skip Cat7 in RJ45 plants.

Cat8 – Impressive Numbers, Very Short Leash

Cat8 is the newest and most extreme of the copper categories. On a spec sheet it looks dramatic: up to 2000 MHz of bandwidth and support for 25G or 40G Ethernet. It is also heavily shielded and usually built as thick, relatively inflexible cable.

The catch is in the fine print: Cat8 is only specified for channel lengths up to 30 metres. That is enough to wire a couple of rows in a data centre between top-of-rack switches and aggregation, but nowhere near enough to serve typical office or campus horizontal runs. For most SMB buildings, a 30 metre limit would barely get you out of the equipment room, let alone to the far corner of a floor.

That does not make Cat8 “bad”; it simply makes it specialised. If you are an SMB or campus operator planning a general office refresh, Cat8 is extremely unlikely to be the right tool. If you ever need 25G or 40G between switches, you will almost certainly use fibre or direct-attach copper inside the rack instead of rewiring the building with Cat8.

PoE, Heat and Why the Cable Category Is Not the Only Variable

When planning upgrades today, you are almost always planning for PoE at the same time: access points, cameras, phones, door controllers, even thin clients. Higher PoE classes mean more current in the pairs, more heat in the bundles and a much greater sensitivity to conductor gauge and installation practices.

Category alone does not tell you everything about PoE behaviour. A slim 28AWG patch cord and a 23AWG horizontal cable may both be labelled “Cat6a”, but they will not handle voltage drop and heating in the same way. If you are using reduced-diameter cords in dense patching fields, it is worth reading the discussion in “28AWG Slim Patch Cords: Thermal & PoE Trade-offs Explained” alongside your PoE budget calculations and any distance-sensitive devices.

For longer runs and higher power levels, voltage drop becomes a design parameter instead of an afterthought. The guide “PoE Power Budget & Voltage Drop Guide” is a useful reference when you begin mixing different cable gauges, PoE classes and powered devices across the same plant.

The short version: choosing Cat6a over Cat6 gives you more headroom, but you still need to pay attention to copper gauge, bundle size and pathway temperature if you are serious about stable PoE.

Cost, Availability and What SMBs Actually Deploy

In theory you could justify almost any category “for future-proofing”. In practice, SMB budgets, local stock and installer familiarity all push the market into fairly predictable patterns. In a lot of regions, Cat6 has become the default because it is cheap and every electrician knows how to pull it. Cat6a is gaining share wherever 10G and high-density PoE are becoming common, especially in new builds and major renovations.

Cat7 and Cat8, by contrast, stay largely in the “special order” bucket, with prices and lead times to match. That might be acceptable for a small run inside a data room, but it quickly becomes a headache if you are trying to cable an entire office floor and finish the job this quarter. When you factor in the labour, test equipment and the need for everyone on the project to understand what is being installed, the marginal benefit of those extra Category numbers usually evaporates.

One more variable that often gets overlooked is copper quality and conductor size. A cheap “Cat6a” that cuts corners on copper, geometry or shielding can perform worse than a well engineered Cat6 in the field. For a deeper look at how gauge and construction affect performance, the post “Understanding Wire Gauge and Its Impact on Ethernet Cable Performance” is a good complement to the category-level view in this article.

So Which Cable Makes Sense for Your Next Upgrade?

If you strip away marketing and look at how real SMB and campus networks behave, a fairly simple picture emerges.

For new horizontal cabling, Cat6a is usually the right answer. It gives you standards-backed 10G to the desktop, plenty of margin for PoE and a clear upgrade path for the next decade. You still need to choose between shielded and unshielded designs based on your environment, but the category itself is a solid baseline to build on.

For existing Cat6 plants, the decision is more about testing than theory. If the cabling is in good shape and your upgrade plans stop at 1G/2.5G to users and APs, there is no reason to tear it out. Where you do need 10G, selective re-cabling on critical paths may make more sense than a building-wide replacement, especially if you first confirm what your current Cat6 can really deliver under load.

Cat7 and Cat8 have their place, but mostly in specialised environments: data centres, non-RJ45 connector systems, short 25/40G links. For most SMBs looking at a mix of office space, classrooms, small clinics or retail, they add complexity faster than they add value.

If you think of the cabling plant as infrastructure that needs to outlive several generations of switches and access points, the question “Cat6 vs Cat6a vs Cat7 vs Cat8” becomes much less abstract. You are not just buying a Category number; you are deciding how much freedom your future self will have when the next wave of upgrades arrives.

FAQ: Cat6 vs Cat6a vs Cat7 vs Cat8

Is Cat7 better than Cat6a for an SMB office?

On paper Cat7 has a higher bandwidth rating than Cat6a, but in RJ45-based SMB networks it rarely brings practical benefits. True Cat7 uses non-RJ45 connectors and sits in ISO/IEC standards, while most enterprise gear and testing tools are built around Cat6/Cat6a with RJ45. For typical offices, Cat6a is the safer and more interoperable choice.

Do I need Cat8 for my next office or school upgrade?

Almost certainly not. Cat8 is designed for very short 25G/40G channels in data centres, with a maximum channel length of 30 metres. SMB and campus horizontal runs are usually much longer than that, so they are better served by Cat6a for copper or fibre where higher speeds are needed.

Is Cat6 enough for 10G?

Cat6 can run 10G over short, well-controlled channels, but its alien crosstalk performance in bundles is weaker than Cat6a. If you only need a few short 10G links and your cabling has been installed carefully, Cat6 may be acceptable. If you want 10G to be routine across a building, Cat6a is the category that was designed for that use case.

Which cable should I choose for Wi-Fi 6/6E/7 access points?

For new installs, Cat6a is a comfortable default: it supports 10G, carries higher-power PoE and gives you margin for the next generation of access points. Existing Cat6 can be fine for 1G/2.5G APs on modest runs, but you should test representative links if you plan to push 5G or 10G over them.