Boosting XR Capacity With Multi-Band Multi-Connectivity in 5G Systems

Emerging eXtended Reality (XR) applications impose strict requirements on throughput, delay, and reliability, which limits the capacity of 5G systems operating only in one band, i.e., either a sub-6-GHz band or a mmWave one. To address this problem, the letter considers a scenario with a mixture of XR and broadband traffic and explores how to boost the capacity for XR traffic with multi-band multi-connectivity, i.e., the joint usage of multiple frequency bands with advanced algorithms that select the best bands for operation and balance the traffic between them. Moreover, the letter evaluates when an increase in the number of connections can provide a value and shows that dual connectivity with advanced algorithms achieves almost the same capacity as triple-connectivity, while the latter significantly increases the user device complexity.