A compact dual-band rectangular microstrip antenna (RMSA) is realized by two different single-slotted single-band rectangular microstrip antennas with slotted ground plane. Each open-ended slot in the single-slotted antenna is responsible to generate a wide impedance band that is shifted to lower frequencies by the effect of the ground slot. The length and position of each open-ended slot is varied to operate the antenna in a suitable resonant band (5.15-5.35 and 5.725-5.825 GHz). The proposed antenna meets the required impedance bandwidth, necessary for dual-band IEEE 802.11a WLAN application (5.125-5.395 and 5.725-5.985 GHz). The dimension of the antenna (12 × 8 × 1.5875 mm3) shows an average compactness of about 53.73% with respect to a conventional unslotted rectangular microstrip patch antenna.