Table 1.

Wireless network technologies and user perceived data transfer rates

Technology	Network theoretical data transfer rates	User typical data transfer rates
2G-GSM (early 1990s)	9.6 to 115 kbps	About 10 kbps
2.5G-GPRS (2001)	9.6 to 171.2 kbps	Between 30 and 50 kbps
2.5G-EDGE (2003)	9.6 to 384 kbps	Between 75 and 135 kbps
3G-UMTS (Release 99, 2001)	144 kbps to 2 Mbps	Between 200 and 300 kbps
3.5G-HSPA (Rel. 7, 2007)	DL: 14.4 Mbps	DL: 1 to 4 Mbps
(HSDPA, Rel. 5, 2005)	UL: 5.76 Mbps	UL: 500 kbps to 2 Mbps
(HSUPA, Rel. 6, 2008)
HSPA + (Rel. 7, 2007)	DL: 21.6 Mbps	DL: ~2 to ~9 Mbps
	UL: 11.5 Mbps	UL: 1 to 4 Mbps
HSPA + (DL: 64 QAM, UL: 16 QAM, dual carrier, 10 + 5 MHz)	DL: 42 Mbps	DL: 3.8 to 17.6 Mbps
	UL: 11.5 Mbps	UL: 1 to 4 Mbps
3.5G-Mobile WiMAX (IEEE 802.16e, 2005)	DL: 46 Mbps	DL: UL: 1 to 5 Mbps
	UL: 4 Mbps
3.9G LTE (Rel. 8, 2008)	DL: 300 Mbps (20 MHz)	DL: 6.5 to 26 Mbps (10 MHz)
	UL: 71 (20 MHz)	UL: 6.0 to 13.0 (10 MHz)
4G-LTE-advanced (Rel. 10, 2010)	DL: 1.2 Gbps	TBD
	UL: 568 Mbps
4G-WirelessMAN-advanced (IEEE 802.16 m, 2010)	DL: > 1 Gbps	TBD
	UL: > 100 Mbps
5G by 2020?	TBD	TBD

Table based on [28]

UL uplink, DL downlink TBD to be defined