Abstract-This paper derives and computes the probability of synchronization failure fail for IEEE 802.11a wireless LANs on frequency-flat Rician fading channels. For a frequency offset within 232 kHz, it is shown that its effect on the synchronization performance is minor. The ds 0 ratios required to achieve fail = 10 3 and 10 4 are computed, where ds is the data-symbol energy. We find that ds 0 ratios over 20 dB are generally required for channels with Rician factors 6 dB. In particular, ds 0 ratios that yield fail = 10 4 exceed 30 dB for 4 dB.Index Terms-Frequency-nonselective channel, IEEE 802.11a, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), probability of synchronization failure, Rician fading, sliding correlator, timing synchronization, wireless local area network (LAN).