A blue light shining from a building

Maximize 5G-Advanced Performance with Proven Test Approaches

5G-Advanced is being planned, tested, and deployed by operators around the world.

There is no shortage of industries and use cases operators are eager to serve, from IoT and non-terrestrial networks, to unmanned aerial vehicles, smart cities, mission-critical services, and extended reality. This is possible through 5G-A Release 18 features and functionality already unlocking real value, with customers seeing:

The 5G-Advanced journey starts with the network core

The 5G Standalone Core is breaking new ground as it transforms the network from a connectivity enabler to a programmable platform that enables continuous innovation and software-driven scalability.

This monetization engine for 5G-Advanced’s capabilities can adapt quickly to changing demand and traffic patterns, simplifying network control and configuration while enabling flexible and rapid feature deployment. Importantly, it never requires whole-system upgrades or major hardware changes.

A screen shot of a computer

As noted above, a wide range of use cases has already been enabled by capabilities introduced in Release 18. Importantly, the network enhancements can be deployed independently based on market demands and business cases.

Release 18 capabilities and the role of the 5G core

5G-A’s capabilities are expansive. For a more detailed analysis of the wide range of R18 capabilities see Keysight’s 5G-Advanced Core: Test and Assurance Strategies for Unlocking Monetization eBook. We’ll discuss two of the key areas here.

eRedCap (Enhanced Reduced Capability), an evolution of Release 17 RedCap, enables mass adoption in sectors like logistics, smart manufacturing, and smart cities. It supports devices that require less bandwidth, use simpler hardware, and consume less energy. Think wearables, industrial sensors, simple IoT modules, vehicle telematics, and parking meters that can run for years. First-movers plan to launch eRedCap by end of 2025, with commercial adoption and mass scaling expected in the following 24 months.

The 5G Core will be central to managing flexible policy rules, access restrictions, and network slice selection. By buffering data while devices sleep, eRedCap can also help fuel power savings.

To ensure performance is as expected, test processes should validate peak data rate compliance at scale with high volumes of devices, check sleep-mode buffering and data delivery during traffic bursts, confirm policy rules and slice selection, and compare eRedCap user equipment performance with full 5G New Radio user equipment (UEs).

A screenshot of a software

Non-terrestrial networks (NTN) gained major enhancements in Release 18, which expand and optimize integration with 5G for IoT, mobility, coverage continuity, and regulatory compliance. While 3GPP-compliant NTN is still in the early stages, adoption is progressing with strong industry momentum and growing market demand for IoT, mobile broadband, and emerging direct-to-device services.

The 5G Core plays a central role in tracking satellites across their mobility and backhaul paths, managing satellite-specific policies and slicing rules, supporting the anchoring of the user plane directly onboard the satellite, and triggering location verification for lawful intercept and emergency services.

Ensuring enhanced satellite-specific mobility, power-saving, and regulatory features will be critical for monetization. Test regimes should validate session preservation and continuity, location accuracy, and large-scale device reattachment storms.

A screenshot of a computer Description automatically generated

Enhanced test and assurance methodologies safely accelerate 5G-A rollouts

5G-A monetization is achievable if it’s backed by robust test and assurance methodologies that result in a faster time-to-market, reduced risks and costs, and enhanced quality and customer satisfaction.

At Keysight, we are already engaged with operators and vendors focused on three primary approaches:

  1. Digital twins for risk-free, repeatable testing with emulated, realistic replicas of 5G networks and traffic. Digital twin emulators can spin thousands or millions of virtual eRedCap sensors, model intermittent NTN satellite coverage, replay bursty traffic across partial slices, and introduce chaos to validate performance, interoperability, compliance, security, and resilience under real-world, peak load, and worst-case conditions.
  2. Continuous testing integrated into continuous integration / continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines to autonomously validate streams of updates and patches and provide underpinning lifecycle management. Pipeline-triggered tests are spun up automatically to emulate network functions and generate synthetic traffic and impairments to provide realism. Defects are caught in the lab within minutes (not weeks later in production), keeping mean-time-to-repair low and feature velocity high without sacrificing reliability.
  3. Active testing in live networks to proactively validate real performance and user experience while delivering actionable feedback loops for rapid fault isolation and root cause analysis. Active testing provides proactive evidence and becomes the operational “contract enforcer” that translates Release 18’s technical potential into assured quality, customer trust, and, ultimately, new revenue streams.

Unlocking the value of 5G-Advanced

The 5G Core enables programmable monetization to unlock value in verticals, enterprises, and consumer use cases. Successful monetization necessitates continuous, automated processes spanning the full network lifecycle.

Keysight’s eBook, 5G-Advanced Core: Test and Assurance Strategies for Unlocking Monetization, highlights the value operators can achieve with Release 18 and the importance of the 5G Core in creating that value. It explores the impact of 5G-A on the 5G Core and explores how the Core plays a central role in enabling twelve key Release 18 features and why those areas demand focused validation and assurance. highlights the value operators can achieve with Release 18 and the importance of the 5G Core in creating that value. It explores the impact of 5G-A on the 5G Core and explores how the Core plays a central role in enabling twelve key Release 18 features and why those areas demand focused validation and assurance.

limit
3