IEEE 802

IEEE 802 is a family of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) standards for local area networks (LANs), personal area networks (PANs), and metropolitan area networks (MANs). The IEEE 802 LAN/MAN Standards Committee (LMSC) maintains these standards. The IEEE 802 family of standards has had twenty-four members, numbered 802.1 through 802.24, with a working group of the LMSC devoted to each. However, not all of these working groups are currently active.

The IEEE 802 standards are restricted to computer networks carrying variable-size packets, unlike cell relay networks, for example, in which data is transmitted in short, uniformly sized units called cells. Isochronous signal networks, in which data is transmitted as a steady stream of octets, or groups of octets, at regular time intervals, are also outside the scope of the IEEE 802 standards.

The most widely used IEEE 802 standards are for Ethernet, bridging and virtual bridged LANs, wireless LAN, wireless PAN, wireless MAN, wireless RAN, , and media-independent handover.