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In service · Rel-15 → Rel-20

5G & 5G-Advanced

5G is a deployed standards family, not a finished one. Its radio and core baseline is stable; current work concentrates on AI-assisted radio, Ambient IoT, satellite access, energy use and operational refinement.

Standardization phase
Standardized and evolving
As of
2026-09-18
Evidence
50 decisions

Read this first

This monitor tracks what 3GPP has standardized. It does not claim that every listed feature is enabled in every commercial network.

The 5G baseline is frozen in completed releases while 5G-Advanced continues to add normative features.

Current baseline

Performance targets

Values are only comparable when their definitions and evaluation scenarios match.

ParameterCurrent valueDefinition and maturityEvidence
Theoretical peak data rate
20 / 10 Gbit/s
Adopted

Downlink / uplink target under the evaluation assumptions in TR 38.913.

Frozen specification

3GPP 38.913
Connection density
10⁶ devices/km²
Adopted

Massive machine-type communication target; this is not user density.

Frozen specification

3GPP 38.913
Radio latency target
1 ms
Adopted

User-plane URLLC target under defined radio conditions, not general end-to-end latency.

Frozen specification

3GPP 38.913
Basic waveform
CP-OFDM · CP-OFDM or DFT-s-OFDM
Adopted

Downlink · uplink. The uplink can trade flexibility for lower peak-to-average power.

Frozen specification

3GPP 38.211
5th-percentile spectral efficiency
0.225 / 0.15 bit/s/Hz
Adopted

Downlink / uplink IMT-2020 requirement in the dense-urban eMBB scenario, as evaluated by 3GPP for NR; TR 38.913 sets it at three times IMT-Advanced.

Frozen specification

3GPP 37.9103GPP 38.913
Horizontal positioning
3 m indoor · 10 m outdoor (80% of UEs, Rel-16)
Adopted

Rel-16 commercial target for 80% of UEs (the 6G figure is the 90th percentile). Rel-17 tightened it to under 1 m for 90% of UEs (TR 38.857).

Frozen specification

3GPP 38.8553GPP 38.857

Radio & spectrum

2 tracked items
01
Adopted

NR air interface

Frozen specificationRel-15 · Rel-16 · Rel-17

CP-OFDM in the downlink, CP-OFDM or DFT-s-OFDM in the uplink, scalable numerology and operation across sub-7 GHz and mmWave bands.

Current movement: Release 20 refines early channel acquisition: phones report in MSG3 which broadcast configurations they support, a MAC-CE field sets the timing of the first report, and RAN2 chooses the system-information block. Uplink power boosting through relaxed transmitter EVM moved to the 6G study.

3GPP 38.211R1-2603720R1-2606466RP-262213
02
Adopted

Channel coding

Frozen specificationRel-15+

LDPC protects user data and Polar codes protect most physical-layer control information.

3GPP 38.212

Network architecture

1 tracked item
01
Adopted

5G Core

Frozen specificationRel-15+

A service-based core separates control and user planes, exposes network capabilities through APIs and supports slicing as a native architectural concept.

Current movement: Rel-20 work continues operational integration, charging resilience and exposure rather than replacing the 5GC baseline.

3GPP 23.501

Capabilities

3 tracked items
01
Contested

AI-compressed channel feedback

Active normative workRel-20

The Release 20 work supports up to 128 antenna ports, rank 4 and 19 subbands, with a standardized fallback quantization codebook.

Current movement: A standardized dataset format with dataset exchange is being specified. Sending performance targets with a pre-trained model was dropped; the September quarterly records no decision on the CQI calculation disputed in June.

R1-2604679R1-2604680R1-2606013
02
Open

Satellite access (NTN)

Active normative workRel-17 · Rel-18 · Rel-19 · Rel-20

NR has supported satellite access since Release 17; phones pre-compensate timing and frequency from their own GNSS position and satellite ephemeris.

Current movement: Release 20 adds operation when GNSS fails, with beam-specific reference locations and a two-root PRACH, and defines high-power PC1.5 phones with two-antenna transmit diversity and single-layer uplink, not dual-layer MIMO.

3GPP 38.300R1-2605609RP-262238
03
Open

Ambient IoT

Active normative workRel-19 · Rel-20

Battery-constrained or battery-less tags reuse selected LTE and NR building blocks instead of introducing a fully separate radio design.

Current movement: Reader IDs now range from 0 to 1007, a broadcast information index carries timing, and two ways to start a data-only uplink were agreed. Phase 2 work continues.

R1-2605021R1-2605126R1-2606202

September 2026 plenaries

What changed

  1. Stopped

    Uplink power boosting through relaxed EVM moves to the 6G study

    The RAN plenary started no Release 20 work on relaxing transmitter EVM with DPoD. Reported link gains ranged from −0.8 to 4.2 dB and testability stayed open; it may become a Release 21 6G objective and return to 5G-Advanced only if the design transfers.

    RP-262213RP-262172
    Timeline item 1
  2. Adopted

    High-power satellite phones get transmit diversity, not dual-layer MIMO

    PC1.5 phones for NR satellite access will use two-antenna transmit diversity and single-layer uplink in this release. Intra-band downlink carrier aggregation targets all existing satellite power classes.

    RP-262238
    Timeline item 2
  3. Open

    RAN2 will choose which system information carries early CSI

    Companies split between SIB1 and a new SIB, so RAN1 left the choice to RAN2. The configuration must reach the phone before MSG3, where the phone reports which configurations it supports.

    R1-2606466R1-2606465R1-2606467
    Timeline item 3
  4. Adopted

    Satellite access prepares for phones without GNSS

    Earth-fixed satellite cells will support beam-specific reference locations for timing and frequency pre-compensation, and a two-root PRACH with non-conjugate roots is the baseline for initial access.

    R1-2605609
    Timeline item 4
  5. Adopted

    AI channel feedback gets a standardized dataset format

    RAN1 agreed a dataset format for AI-based CSI compression. A proposal to send performance targets with a pre-trained model was dropped for lack of a shared reference dataset.

    R1-2606013
    Timeline item 5
  6. Adopted

    Ambient IoT settles reader identity and timing

    Reader IDs range from 0 to 1007, periodic broadcasts carry a broadcast information index for timing, and data-only devices can start an uplink with a Msg1-like message or a scheduling request.

    R1-2606202
    Timeline item 6
  7. Superseded

    Early channel acquisition gets a fixed system-information recipe

    Phones entering connected mode will receive the early CSI configuration through SIB1; dynamic MSG4 parameters were rejected.

    R1-2603720
    Timeline item 7
  8. Adopted

    AI feedback formats narrow while the quality metric remains open

    Antenna scale, report structure and quantization moved forward. Vendors still disagree over whether CQI needs one fixed calculation.

    R1-2604679R1-2604680
    Timeline item 8
  9. Open

    Ambient IoT reuses existing codes but keeps synchronization choices open

    The design continues to borrow proven LTE and NR mechanisms; reader identity, timing and signal periodicity still require a decision.

    R1-2605021R1-2605126
    Timeline item 9

Read the editorial account in 3GPP Quarterly — September 2026.

Evidence index

50 5G and 5G-Advanced decisions from 12 meetings in the September 2026 quarterly. Security, consent and management study texts are not reflected because they do not change the monitored features. Each published claim points to a specification, TDoc or the quarterly evidence set. Maturity and meeting outcome are recorded separately.