5G/NR - Acronyms           

 

 

 

 

There are so many Acronyms in 3GPP (probably in all other technologies) and these acronyms are defined in many different documents. In many cases I had to search through many different documents just to find the meaning (full words) for those acronyms. After repeating these open-look-close so many times, I decided to put all those terms in a single page for quick search.

Acronym

Meaning

5GC 5G Core Network
5G-EIR 5G Equipment Identity Register
5QI 5G QoS Identifier
AAS BS Active Antenna System BS
ACK Acknowledgement
AF Application Function
AM Acknowledged Mode
AMBR Aggregated Maximum Bit Rate
AMC

Adaptive Modulation and Coding

AMF Access and Mobility Management Function
AP Application Protocol
ARP Address Resolution Protocol
ARQ Automatic Repeat request
AS Access Stratum
ASN.1 Abstract Syntax Notation One
AUSF Authentication Service Function
BA Bandwidth Adaptation
BAP Backhaul Adaptation Protocol
BCH Broadcast Channel
BLER Block Error Rate
BPSK Binary Phase Shift Keying
BSF Binding Support Function
BSR Buffer Status Report
BWP Bandwidth part
CA Carrier Aggregation
CB Code block
CBG Code block group
CCCH Common Control Channel
CCE Control channel element
CE Control Element
CID Context Identifier
CM Connection Management
CMAS Commercial Mobile Alert Service
COT Channel Occupancy Time
CP Cyclic prefix
CP Control Plane
CQI Channel quality indicator
CRC Cyclic redundancy check 
CRI CSI-RS Resource Indicator
C-RNTI Cell RNTI
CS Configured Scheduling
CSI Channel state information
CSI-RS Channel state information reference signal
CSI-RSRP CSI reference signal received power
CSI-RSRQ CSI reference signal received quality
CSI-SINR CSI signal-to-noise and interference ratio

CS-RNTI

Configured Scheduling RNTI

CU Centeral Unit
CW Codeword
DC

Dual Connectivity

DCCH Dedicated Control Channel
DCI Downlink control information
DFT-s-OFDM Discrete Fourier Transform-spread-Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
DL Downlink

DL-SCH

Downlink Shared Channel

DM-RS Dedicated demodulation reference signals
DN Data Network
DNN Data Network Name (Same as APN name in LTE)
DRA Diameter Routing Agent
DRB Data Radio Bearer carrying user plane data
DRX Discontinuous Reception
DU Distributed Unit
EHPLMN Equivalent Home Public Land Mobile Network
EN-DC EUTRA-NR Dual Connectivity
EPC Evolved Packet Core
EPRE Energy per resource element
EPS Evolved Packet System
ETWS Earthquake and Tsunami Warning System
E-UTRA Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access
E-UTRAN Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network
F1AP F1 Application Protocol
F1-C F1 Control plane interface
F1-U F1 User plane interface
FDD Frequency Division Duplex
FEC Forward Error Correction
FFS For Further Study
FMC First Missing Count
GERAN GSM/EDGE Radio Access Network
GF Grant Free
GFBR Guaranteed Flow Bit Rate
gNB NR Node B

gNB-CU

gNB Central Unit

gNB-DU

gNB Distributed Unit

GNSS Global Navigation Satellite System
GSCN Global Synchronization Raster Channel
GSM Global System for Mobile Communications
GTP-U GPRS Tunnelling Protocol
HARQ Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request
HARQ-ACK Hybrid automatic repeat request acknowledgement 
HFN Hyper Frame Number
IAB Integrated Access/Backhaul
IE Information element
IETF Internet Engineering Task Force
IMEI International Mobile Equipment Identity
IMSI International Mobile Subscriber Identity
IP Internet Protocol
kB Kilobyte (1000 bytes)
L1 Layer 1
L2 Layer 2 (data link layer)
L3 Layer 3 (network layer)
LADN Local Area Data Network
LCG Logical Channel Group
LDPC Low Density Parity Check
MAC Medium Access Control
MAC-I Message Authentication Code for Integrity
MCG Master Cell Group
MCS Modulation and coding scheme
MEC Mobile Edge Computing
MFBR Maximum Flow Bit Rate
MIB Master Information Block
MICO

Mobile Initiated Connection Only

MIMO Multiple Input Multiple Output
MN Master Node

MR-DC

Multi-RAT Dual Connectivity

N/A Not Applicable
NAS Non-Access Stratum
NCGI NR Cell Global Identifier
NCR Neighbour Cell Relation

NE-DC

NR-E-UTRA Dual Connectivity

NEF Network Exposure Function

ng-eNB

node providing E-UTRA user plane and control plane protocol terminations towards the UE, and connected via the NG interface to the 5GC

NGEN-DC

NG-RAN E-UTRA-NR Dual Connectivity

NG-RAN NG Radio Access Network
NGAP

NG Application Protocol

NR NR Radio Access
NRF NF Repository Function
NSA Non StandAlone
NSSAI

Network Slice Selection Assistance Information

NSSF Network Slice Selection Function
NWDAF Network Data Analytics Function
OAM Operation, Administration, Maintenance
O&M Operation and Maintenance
OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
OSI Other System Information
PBCH Physical Broadcast Channel
PCell Primary Cell
PCH Paging Channel
PDCCH Physical downlink control channel
PDCP Packet Data Convergence Protocol
PDSCH Physical downlink shared channel
PRACH

Physical Random Access Channel

PSS

Primary Synchronisation Signal

PUCCH

Physical uplink control channel

PUSCH

Physical uplink shared channel

PDU Protocol Data Unit
PHR Power Headroom Report
PLMN Public Land Mobile Network
PMI Precoding Matrix Indicator
PRACH Physical random access channel
PRB Physical resource block
PRG Physical resource block group
PSS Primary synchronization signal
PTAG Primary Timing Advance Group
PTI

Procedure Transaction Identity

PT-RS Phase-tracking reference signal
PUCCH Physical uplink control channel
PUSCH Physical uplink shared channel
PWS Public Warning System
QAM Quadrature Amplitude Modulation
QCL Quasi-collocation
QFI QoS Flow ID
QoS Quality of Service
QPSK Quadrature Phase Shift Keying
RACH

Random Access Channel

RAN Radio Access Network
RAT Radio Access Technology
RB Resource block
RB Radio Bearer
RBG Resource block group
RE Resource element 
REG Resource element group
RF Radio Frequency
RI Rank indication
RIV Resource indicator value
RLC Radio Link Control
RMSI Remaining Minimum SI(System Information)
RNA RAN-based Notification Area
RNAU RAN-based Notification Area Update
RNL Radio Network Layer
RNTI Radio Network Temporary Identifier
ROHC RObust Header Compression
RPLMN Registered Public Land Mobile Network
RQA Reflective QoS Attribute
RQoS Reflective Quality of Service
RRC Radio Resource Control
RS Reference signal 
RSRP Reference signal received power
RTP Real Time Protocol
SA StandAlone
SAP Service Access Point
SBA Srvice Based Architecture
SCell Secondary Cell
SCEF Service Capability Exposure Function
SCG Secondary cell group
SCH Shared Channel
SCP Service Communication Proxy
SCTP Stream Control Transmission Protocol
SDAP Service Data Adaptation Protocol
SDF Service Data Flow
SDU Service Data Unit
SFN System Frame Number
SI System Information
SIB System Information Block
SM Session Management
SMF Session Management Function
SMSF Short Message Service Function
SMTC

SS block based RRM measurement timing configuration

SN Sequence Number
SN Secondary Node
SNN Serving Network Name
S-NSSAI

Single NSSAI(Network Slice Selection Assistance Information)

SpCell Special Cell
SPS Semi-Persistent Scheduling
SR Scheduling request
SRB Signalling Radio Bearer
SRB Signalling Radio Bearer carrying control plane data
SRS Sounding reference signal
SS Synchronisation signal
SSB

Synchronization Signal Block

SSC Session and Service Continuity
SS-RSRP SS reference signal received power
SS-RSRQ SS reference signal received quality
SSS Secondary synchronization signal
SS-SINR SS signal-to-noise and interference ratio
SST Slice/Service Type
STAG Secondary Timing Advance Group
S-TMSI SAE Temporary Mobile Station Identifier
SUL

Supplementary Uplink

TA Timing advance
TAG Timing advance group 
TB Transport Block
TCI Transmission Configuration Indicator
TCP Transmission Control Protocol
TPC Transmit Power Control
TDD Time Division Duplex
TDM Time division multiplexing
TM Transparent Mode
TNL Transport Network Layer
TRP Transmission and Reception Point

TPC-CS-RNTI

Transmit Power Control-Configured Scheduling-RNTI

TPC-PUCCH-RNTI

Transmit Power Control-Physical Uplink Control Channel-RNTI

TPC-PUSCH-RNTI

Transmit Power Control-Physical Uplink Shared Channel-RNTI

TPC-SRS-RNTI

Transmit Power Control-Sounding Reference Symbols-RNTI

TTI

Transmission Time Interval

UCI Uplink control information
UDM Unified Data Management
UDP User Datagram Protocol
UDR User Data Repository
UDSF Unstructured Data Storage Function
UE User equipment 
UICC Universal Integrated Circuit Card
UL Uplink
UL-SCH Uplink shared channel
UM Unacknowledged Mode
UP User Plane
UPF User Plane Function

URLLC

Ultra-Reliable and Low Latency Communications

URN

Uniform Resource Name

UTC Coordinated Universal Time
UTRAN Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network
X-MAC Computed MAC-I
Xn

network interface between NG-RAN nodes

Xn-C

Xn-Control plane (control plane interface between NG-RAN and 5GC)

Xn-U

Xn-User plane (user plane interface between NG-RAN and 5GC)

XnAP

Xn Application Protocol