The International Standards Organization 3GPP officially announced that the first evolution standard R16 (release-16) in the 5G was officially frozen. The so-called freeze does not stop from today, but signifies that the R16 standard has been fully formed and can meet commercial requirements. That is to say, from today, the technology mentioned in the R16 standard is moving from research and development to our lives.
According to the timeline announced on the 3GPP official website, the R16 standard successfully completed the freeze as planned, which is also an important milestone in the development of 5G.
From the official information, R16 is mainly aimed at the expansion of vertical industrial applications, the continuous evolution of the system architecture, multi-access and AI functions to adapt to the SA architecture version of multiple application scenarios.
Maybe ordinary users don’t understand it. What’s relevant to each user is to add more 5G-related applications (currently I believe everyone uses SpeedTest most), to provide a better access experience (including better signals, Faster network speed, lower latency, etc.) and to bring more 5G equipment.
The previous R15 standard has been frozen in 2018. During this period, the main job of operators is to deploy 5G base stations that comply with the standard according to this standard. The most important thing is to support eMBB (enhanced mobile broadband) and URLLC (low latency and high reliability).
The current R16 standard adds mMTC (large-scale machine communication), network slicing, millimeter wave communication and other functional enhancements on the previous basis.
Specifically, R15 satisfies the fastest speed to allow most major regions to meet the “5G usable” standard and meet the basic functions of 5G networks. The frozen R16 standard is from “usable” to “easy to use”.
In addition, the commercialization of the R16 standard is not an abolition of the previous standard, but an upgrade, which is mainly based on software upgrades, and will not affect the use of currently built base stations or terminal equipment. Consumers can rest assured.
In general, the new standard is officially commercialized, which is a good thing for consumers, especially consumers who are waiting and seeing. Now that they can completely dispel concerns, 5G construction will get better and better.
