An introduction to LoRaWAN

In this video, we give you a short introduction to the LoRaWAN technology. 

So what is LoRaWAN?

LoRaWAN stands for Long Range Wide Area Network. It is a wireless network protocol that allows transmitting data over large distances.

It is based on the LoRa radio modulation technique, which is designed to support the transmission of small packets of data at low bit rates over large areas. 

In contrast to other connectivity technologies, LoRaWAN uses little power, and devices supporting this technology are typically able to run on battery for months, if not years.

Now, if we add the fact that LoRa hardware and sensors are relatively inexpensive, one can easily understand why the adoption of LoRaWAN-based solutions has increased over the past years.

A typical IoT system architecture.

It all starts with the devices. These can be sensors, measuring different environmental values, or actuators. 

These devices communicate to LoRa gateways, which channel all received messages to the network server. 

LoRaWAN uses a “star”-shaped architecture, which means the gateways are not assigned to specific nodes. Instead, data broadcasted by a node is received by multiple gateways. 

It is then the responsibility of the Network Server to filter those messages and verify the data integrity before passing the data to the Application server. 

The application server can take the form of an IoT platform that handles device management, data processing, rule engine and other advanced functionalities. 

Good IoT platforms offer integrations for different LoRaWAN network servers. This makes device management seamless as the device is only managed on one platform.

At the end of the data path, you have the end-user application, which can be a data visualization dashboard or a more complex web application or cloud analytics tool.

The fastest and easiest way to get started with an IoT project based on LoRaWAN is to use the connectivity-as-a-service of state-of-the-art IoT platforms. 

In this case, you don't need to subscribe to a separate connectivity contract with a network operator. Instead, you can use the LoRaWAN network of your choice, directly in the IoT platform.

Discover the LoRaWAN network providers currently available on the akenza platform.