@dalias @nilix @joe @r @pinskia @cr1901 @astraleureka @mirabilos There are also laptops and even desktops motherboard with fullmac devices.

All fullmac devices run a firmware that contains the equivalent of mac80211 (MLME), so if you can rewrite their firmware, you can probably turn them to softmac devices. But that's a big if, since vendors lock everything down.

fullmac devices still have some advantages. They offload work off the CPU, and the CPU can even go to sleep while still connected to an AP, so the system uses less power. The offload is also useful for modern gigafast devices (think 802.11ax/be/bn) where the CPU can be a limiting factor. In fact, many modern devices are a blend of softmac and fullmac.