Alps Alpine

Choosing the right connectivity for your asset tracking solution matters more than most people realise. Picking the wrong solution can lead to misplaced assets, short battery life for trackers, or a device that simply will not connect in the markets you need it to.

In our previous article, we introduced various connectivity technologies, including LTE-M. Today, we are adding a second piece to that picture. LTE Cat1-bis. As their name says, they both run on the same LTE networks your assets already depend on, and they are also purpose-built for IoT. But the two technologies make very different trade-offs, and understanding those differences is what will help you choose the right tracker for your operation.

When people think of LTE, they usually think of smartphones. But LTE for IoT is not a single standard. The 3GPP body defines a range of device categories, each engineered with different priorities: how quickly data moves, how much power the device consumes, how compact the hardware can be, and how widely the network is deployed.

For asset trackers specifically, two of these categories have emerged as the most relevant choices today: LTE-M (also called Cat-M1) and LTE Cat1-bis. They are complementary, not competing. One has been quietly doing the heavy lifting for years. The other arrives at exactly the right moment to fill the gaps that the first cannot.

LTE-M was introduced in 3GPP Release 13 specifically to serve IoT devices. Its defining strength is power efficiency. It supports Power Saving Mode (PSM) and Extended Discontinuous Reception (eDRX), two features that allow a device to sleep deeply between transmissions and wake only when needed. The result is battery life measured in years rather than months.

For moving assets, LTE-M also offers seamless cell handover. A tracker on a truck crossing from France into Belgium does not drop its connection and re-register with a new tower. It switches transparently, which matters more than people often realise when you are tracking assets in real time across long distances.

As of 2024, LTE-M is supported by over 60 mobile network operators in 45 countries. That footprint is strong in North America, Western Europe, Japan, South Korea, and Australia. Where it gets complicated is in markets where carriers have not yet activated the LPWA overlay on their existing LTE networks. In those regions, an LTE-M device simply cannot connect, even if an LTE signal is available.

Worth knowing: LTE-M is built into the 5G specification, making it effectively future-proof. Choosing LTE-M today is not a short-term compromise.

LTE Cat1-bis is a streamlined evolution of the original LTE Cat1 standard. The key change is straightforward: it drops from two antennas to one. That single hardware simplification reduces component cost, shrinks the PCB footprint, and makes the device easier to certify and manufacture at scale, all without sacrificing much in the way of performance.

Data speeds tell a clear story. LTE-M tops out at around 1 Mbps in both directions. Cat1-bis reaches up to 10 Mbps downlink and 5 Mbps uplink. For most basic tracking use cases, that extra headroom does not matter much. But for assets that transmit richer telemetry, require frequent over-the-air firmware updates, or generate larger data payloads, the difference is real.

The more significant advantage, however, is coverage. Cat1-bis operates on the standard LTE spectrum that every carrier already runs. There is no special LPWA activation required. If LTE exists in a country, Cat1-bis works there. For businesses deploying assets globally across markets where LTE-M operator support is patchy or absent, this removes the carrier-vetting problem entirely.

LTE-M is the right choice when battery life and coverage depth matter most. LTE Cat1-bis is the right choice when your operation spans regions with inconsistent LTE-M support, when you need higher throughput, or when you want a single device model that works reliably anywhere LTE is available.

They are not in competition. They are two tools built for two different versions of the same problem.