Abstract-This paper proposes a unified medium access control (MAC) design methodology and presents the implementation of the IEEE 802.11ac down-link multi-user multi-input and multi-output wireless local area network MAC using the proposed design methodology. The proposed methodology employs unified code for both network simulation and system implementation. Because the unified code closely relates these two processes, the performance of the implemented MAC system can be estimated before implementation. The MAC architecture for an access point implemented using the proposed design methodology is verified on an ARM-based platform, and it is applied to a 65 nm CMOS library.Index Terms-WLAN, IEEE 802.11ac, MAC, MU-MIMO, unified design methodology