Broadcom AMBA (BCMA) bus support for BCM43xx Wi-Fi and BCM47xx SoCs
Bus-glue code for Broadcom's AMBA-based interconnect, used to wire up Broadcom Wi-Fi chips like the BCM4313, BCM4331, and BCM4360 found in laptops and PCIe cards from the early 2010s, as well as the BCM47xx and BCM53xx system-on-chip families that powered a generation of Broadcom-based home routers and access points.
recommendation
Worth keeping but documenting as legacy support, since the hardware stopped being sold new years ago yet a long tail of Broadcom-based routers (notably the BCM47xx platforms still tracked by OpenWrt) and older Wi-Fi cards remain in service. The code is not abandoned: a stable backport landed as recently as December 2025, and there is no replacement subsystem to migrate users to, so removal would simply orphan working hardware.
repository signals
sources
- lore.kernel.org
BCMA still receives upstream maintenance and stable backports; a 2025 patch updated core device-registration behavior.
- cateee.net
BCMA is an in-tree Broadcom-specific AMBA bus driver covering older Broadcom PCI Wi-Fi parts such as BCM4313/4331/4360 and remains present in current kernel series.
- cateee.net
BCMA also supports Broadcom BCM47xx-family SoC integration via the BCMA host-SoC path.
- openwrt.org
OpenWrt documents BCMA-based Broadcom BCM47xx/53xx router hardware as legacy router/AP platforms, indicating surviving field deployments rather than mainstream new designs.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
`drivers/bcma` is a real driver directory (local `rg` on Kconfig/source showed Broadcom AMBA bus support plus host PCI/SoC entry points). Lore evidence came from `mcp__lore_http__.lore_activity` on `drivers/bcma/main.c`, which returned a 2025 stable backport URL, so the code is maintained rather than abandoned. Deployment evidence came from `web.search_query` results on LKDDb and OpenWrt pages: LKDDb ties BCMA to older BCM43xx PCI Wi-Fi and BCM47xx SoCs; OpenWrt places BCMA in Broadcom router generations that persist in hobbyist/embedded use. I found no positive removal evidence in the limited lore checks, so this looks legacy-but-still-maintained: keep it, but annotate as low-deployment legacy support with no obvious replacement driver.