A comparative performance analysis of LoRaWAN in two frequency spectra: EU868 MHz and 2.4 GHz

Abstract

During the latest years, LoRaWAN has emerged as a valid alternative to cellular technologies for Internet of Things applications, thanks to its long-range capabilities and high energy efficiency at the expense of a very limited bit rate. To support highly demanding applications, in 2017, Semtech released the first LoRa module working at 2.4 GHz, but the LoRaWAN protocol has not been updated to support such a version, despite the wider frequency channels available in this frequency portion. In this paper, we perform a quantitative analysis on the exploitation of this frequency spectrum in the currently released LoRaWAN version, comparing it with the standard EU868 MHz version. By means of extensive ad-hoc network simulations obtained with the open-source LoRaWANSim, we point out the main advantages of the 2.4 GHz version (e.g., higher throughput) and disadvantages (e.g., coverage issues), for both transmission directions, and as a function of different parameters, such as the number of devices, gateways, area size, and payload. Numerical results show that LoRaWAN at 2.4 GHz is a viable solution for scenarios characterized by a high density of nodes in a limited area, whereas LoRaWAN in the EU868 MHz spectrum remains the preferred choice when considering wide environments.