linux-drivers/
drivers/net/wireless/ath/ath9k

Qualcomm Atheros AR5xxx/AR9xxx 802.11n Wi-Fi adapters (ath9k)

A broad family of 802.11n Wi-Fi chips Atheros (later Qualcomm Atheros) shipped from roughly 2008 through the mid-2010s, covering parts from the AR5416 through the AR9565. They appeared in countless laptop mini-PCIe cards, USB dongles via sibling drivers, and in the Wi-Fi blocks of MIPS-based Atheros router SoCs that powered a generation of consumer access points and OpenWrt devices.

keep-annotate conf=0.77 last_sold=2016 deploy=medium replacement=none subsystem=net category=networking-wireless
77%

recommendation

It should stay in the kernel and simply be marked as legacy hardware. Even though the chips have not been sold new for years and only support 802.11n, the driver is still being actively patched upstream (bug fixes were landing as recently as 2026) and is regularly exercised by syzbot, so it is far from abandoned. A very large installed base remains in the field, particularly in OpenWrt-supported ath79 routers and older laptops, which makes removal premature.

repository signals

112 files
88,053 source lines
159 commits, 5y
+1,669 / −1,493 lines added / removed, 5y
67 authors, 5y
monthly commits · 2021-04-21 → 2026-04-21 · 159 total · active in 50/61 months
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sources

  1. lore.kernel.org

    ath9k still receives upstream bug-fix patches in 2026; this patch fixes an out-of-bounds access in ath9k firmware tx status handling.

  2. lore.kernel.org

    ath9k is still exercised by syzbot and patch discussion in 2026, indicating active maintenance and test exposure rather than abandonment.

  3. wireless.docs.kernel.org

    Kernel wireless docs describe ath9k as the driver for Atheros 802.11n chipsets including AR5416 through AR9565-era parts, i.e. an older 11n family rather than current-generation Wi-Fi hardware.

  4. openwrt.org

    OpenWrt still maintains the ath79 target and documents device support on current releases, which is strong evidence of continued field deployment of ath9k-era Atheros SoCs in routers/APs.

  5. wireless.docs.kernel.org

    The ath9k product list is dominated by older retail laptops/APs from the 802.11n era, supporting the view that new-sales presence is largely legacy rather than active 2025 mainstream retail.

codex reasoning notes (technical)

Recommendation is keep-annotate: lore evidence shows current maintenance activity, so deprecation/removal would be premature, but the hardware family is clearly legacy 802.11n and mostly relevant for existing fleets. No indexed removal/deprecation discussion was found in the tool results used. Source acquisition: first two URLs came from lore-http `lore_regex` patch hits; the three docs URLs came from `web.search_query`. `last_widely_available_year` is an inferred estimate from the documented chipset/product era, not a vendor EOL date.