1024-QAM technology allows each subcarrier to carry __ bits.

Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM) is a digital signal modulation scheme that represents data bits by modulating both the amplitude and phase of a carrier frequency. The number of bits transmitted per symbol per subcarrier is mathematically defined by log2(M), where M represents the constellation order. For 1024-QAM, which was introduced into mainstream wireless local area networking standards with IEEE 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6), the constellation contains 1024 unique signal points (2^10 = 1024). Consequently, each subcarrier configured with 1024-QAM modulation carries exactly 10 bits of data per spatial symbol. This high-order modulation improves physical layer throughput and spectral efficiency by 25% compared to the 256-QAM (8 bits per subcarrier) scheme used in 802.11ac.

A. Carrying 8 bits per subcarrier corresponds to 256-QAM (2^8 = 256), which is the maximum modulation scheme defined in IEEE 802.11ac.
C. Carrying 12 bits per subcarrier corresponds to 4096-QAM (2^12 = 4096), which is introduced in IEEE 802.11be (Wi-Fi 7).
D. Carrying 14 bits per subcarrier corresponds to 16384-QAM (2^14 = 16384), which exceeds standardized Wi-Fi subcarrier modulation specifications.

- IEEE Standard 802.11ax-2021, Section 27.3.11 "HE-MCS", IEEE Computer Society, 2021.

- Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., "Wi-Fi 6 Technology White Paper", Chapter 3: "Key Technologies of Wi-Fi 6: 1024-QAM", Document ID: HW-WLAN-WF6-WP, 2020.