In this paper, the practical limitations of scalable electronic two-dimensional (2D) beamsteering using metamaterials at Micro- and Millimetre-wave frequencies, are addressed. In particular, the practical effects of using varactor diodes on a metamaterial-based beamsteering transmitarray, are studied and
characterised, at four different frequencies of interest: 5, 14, 28 and 60 GHz. The parasitic effects intrinsic to such components, namely the internal resistance and internal inductance, are being studied. A thorough parametric analysis in CST Microwave Studio is conducted, in order to ascertain how the varactor’s
parasitics affect the frequency response, insertion loss, bandwidth and maximum achieved phase shift and consequent beamsteering resolution, at the proposed frequencies. The parametric study targets the parasitic resistance and inductance values of varactor diodes commercially available, making this study useful for any RF transmitarray implementation