Thank you! This cleared a lot of things up. So, an AP that starts with MR is native Meraki and it can ONLY be managed via Meraki cloud. I always understood that. Its easy. Its the Catalyst line that is confusing. So, as I understand it, all APs that are NOT Meraki native are called Cisco Catalyst APs. BUT, to really understand their management paradigm and capabilities, you have to look at the actual SKU/part number. All native Cisco APs are called "Cisco Catalyst" APs. Now, looking deeper into the SKU as I stated above, let's take an example with the Cisco Catalyst 9166. That AP has 2 parent SKU numbers for the APs themselves of CW9166I (integrated omni-directional antennas) or CW9166D (integrated directional antennas). And, because the SKU starts with CW, it denotes that it can be managed by both an on-prem Catalyst 9800 controller or via Meraki Cloud (which I think is going to be called Cisco Catalyst Center). In the case of the former, the parent SKU of, say, CW9166I is further augmented with the "-domain/country code" to create CW9166I-x. In the case of the latter (Meraki/Cisco cloud managed), it becomes CW9166i-MR. On the other hand, some Cisco Catalyst APs are NOT "CW" series SKUs, but instead "C" SKUs, such as the C9136I-x, which is the SKU for the Cisco Catalyst 9136I (integrated omni-directional antennas). That AP is ONLY managed via an on-prem 9800 controller because of the "C" designation in the SKU. So, as I stated above, you MUST look at the SKUs to really understand how they can be deployed. So, what you wrote below should be in the first paragraph of every Cisco Catalyst AP landing page. All Meraki APs that start with MR, e.g. MR33, MR36, MR46E, etc. are Meraki native Access Points. All APs with CW, e.g. CW9162, CW9164 are dual-mode APs which can be in either Catalyst persona or Meraki persona, and may be converted back and forth. All APs with C, e.g. C9120, C9130, C9136 etc. are Catalyst only APs, meaning they can not be managed by the Meraki Dashboard, and thus requires a Wireless Controller. Thank you once again! By the way, I'm afraid of what is going to happen with WiFi7 - yet MORE changes.
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