Calculate 5G NR Physical Layer Throughput

Throughput is a critical performance metric for 5G NR networks.

Calculating 5G NR throughput is important for several reasons:

1. Network performance evaluation: Throughput is a key indicator of network performance. Calculating 5G NR throughput helps network operators evaluate the effectiveness of their network design, configuration, and optimization.

2. Quality of service (QoS) assessment: Throughput is one of the main factors that determines the QoS of a network. Calculating 5G NR throughput helps network operators assess whether their network is delivering the required QoS to users.

3. Capacity planning: Throughput calculating is also important for capacity planning. By knowing the maximum throughput that can be achieved on a 5G NR network, network operators can plan for the number of users that can be supported simultaneously on the network.

Overall, calculating 5G NR throughput is crucial for ensuring that 5G networks are operating efficiently, meeting user requirements, and complying with regulatory standards. This article takes NI 5G NR Test UE as an example for calculating the down link throughput. The intended audiences are RF engineers who have good knowledge of 3GPP 5G NR specifications, and need to verify the measured 5G NR throughput. 

1. Get the 5G NR Test UE configurations from the configuration file, consider NI 5G NR Test UE as an example and is summarized as below:

There are 11 slots (1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 15, 16, 17), 4 layers and 256QAM (MCS 27) used for data transmission in PDSCH channel. 

2. Refer to below for 3GPP MCS Table 2 which is used in this article:

3. Refer to above for the Spectral Efficiency of MCS 27, which is 7.4063.

4. The throughput is calculated from below formula:

5. The user can apply the above calculation to verify 5G system, refer to below screen shoot for measured PDSCH Throughput of NI 5G NR Test UE, which is 1.298Gbps and very close to 1.3Gbps.