u-blox Launches MAYA-W5 and NORA-W5 Wi-Fi 6 Module Families
The new MAYA-W5 and NORA-W5 modules bring Wi-Fi 6 and BLE to IoT designs with two distinct architectures and European manufacturing.
u-blox has announced two new Wi-Fi 6 module families, the MAYA-W5 and NORA-W5, designed to bring 802.11ax connectivity to a broad range of IoT applications without the overhead of chip-level wireless design. Both families pair Wi-Fi 6 with Bluetooth Low Energy in compact, globally certified packages, and both are built on Texas Instruments chipsets and manufactured in Europe, a combination that u-blox says directly addresses supply chain risk concerns that have plagued embedded wireless development in recent years.
Two Architectures, One Platform Strategy
The two module families take meaningfully different approaches to integration. The MAYA-W5 is a host-based module centered on TI’s CC3351 chipset. It offloads wireless processing to the host processor and communicates via SDIO for Wi-Fi and UART for Bluetooth, a familiar arrangement for designs that already have an application processor on board and want to add wireless capability with minimal firmware overhead. The single available variant, the MAYA-W566-00B, measures 10.3 × 14.3 × 1.9 mm and features an integrated PCB antenna, a temperature range of −40 °C to 85 °C, and secure boot support.
The NORA-W5, by contrast, is a stand-alone solution built around TI’s CC3501 (single-band) and CC3551 (dual-band) chipsets. Each variant integrates an Arm Cortex-M33 MCU running at 160 MHz, up to 8 MB of flash, and 1 MB of RAM, which is enough headroom to run application code directly on the module. The NORA-W5 lineup spans eight variants across a matrix of single- and dual-band configurations, internal PCB antenna or external antenna pin, and open CPU versus u-connectXpress software options. The u-connectXpress variants expose Wi-Fi and Bluetooth functionality through an AT command interface, enabling fast integration for teams that don’t want to write low-level wireless firmware. All NORA-W5 variants share the same 10.4 mm width and are pin-compatible with other modules in u-blox’s NORA portfolio, easing migration from earlier generations.
Security and Connectivity Features
Both families support Wi-Fi 6 Target Wake Time (TWT), which allows devices to schedule transmissions and spend more time in low-power states—particularly valuable for battery-operated IoT nodes. The NORA-W5 extends the security story further with Arm TrustZone-M, WPA3, TLS, secure firmware-over-the-air updates, and Matter support, covering most of what a developer building a connected industrial or consumer device would need from a security checklist. Interface coverage on the open-CPU NORA-W5 variants is also notably broad, including UART, SPI, I2C, I2S, CAN, SDIO, GPIO, and ADC. This gives them enough peripheral flexibility to serve as the primary MCU in simpler designs.
Wi-Fi 6’s Target Wake Time support makes it well-suited to dense industrial environments where many wireless nodes share the same network. Image used courtesy of Abode Stock
Target Applications and Availability
u-blox positions both families across a range of market segments: smart home and building, industrial automation, healthcare, and asset tracking. The modular approach, where MAYA-W5 slots into host-processor designs and NORA-W5 can operate as a standalone wireless MCU, gives the lineup genuine flexibility across product categories and resource constraints. Samples are expected to become available within the coming month.
For engineers navigating the persistent tension between time-to-market, supply chain reliability, and connectivity performance, the MAYA-W5 and NORA-W5 are worth a close look. The combination of Wi-Fi 6’s improved efficiency, a well-documented TI chipset foundation, European manufacturing, and u-blox’s established certification and support infrastructure makes these modules a compelling option, whether the target application is a smart meter, an industrial gateway, or a connected medical device.
