Mobile Technology

NearLink launches, 6X faster than Bluetooth, with 1/30th the latency

Huawei's new NearLink technology is vastly faster, more efficient, longer-range and lower latency than Bluetooth
Huawei
Huawei's new NearLink technology is vastly faster, more efficient, longer-range and lower latency than Bluetooth
Huawei

Huawei has launched a breakthrough short-range wireless connection tech, aiming to combine the advantages of Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Faster, more efficient and with a vastly reduced delay, it's also got more than 300 companies and institutions on board.

Today's official launch comes after the technology was presented at Huawei's Developer Conference in August. Compared with "traditional wireless technologies," Huawei says NearLink offers:

  • 60% lower power consumption
  • Six times higher data transmission speed
  • 1/30th the latency
  • 7 dB improvement anti-interference for a more stable connection
  • Twice the coverage distance, and
  • 10 times more network connections

It'll roll out in a variety of devices, including consumer electronics like phones, laptops, smart watches, connected-home gadgets, electric vehicles and industrial manufacturing gear, becoming a part of Huawei's HarmonyOS 4 operating system. It's already integrated into the company's latest Mate 60 smartphone.
"This technology," reads a press release, "brings together the collective collaboration of more than 300 leading enterprises and institutions at home and abroad."

According to Techradar, nearly all the companies involved with NearLink thus far are Chinese, notably including Hisense, Honor and Lenovo. The only internationals, it seems, are Taiwan's Mediatek and French construction materials manufacturer St. Gobain.

Given that Huawei remains on a US sanctions blacklist, it seems NearLink is unlikely to roll out on American devices. Apple, for its part, has already released its own ultra-wideband (UWB) technology in the form of its new U1 chip – although according to Apple Insider, UWB's main advantage over Bluetooth is highly-accurate location tracking rather than bulk speed and latency improvements.

Source: Huawei

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7 comments
WillyDoodle
Wow. America really has given up the lead.
dave be
@willy
We (the US) have never had 'the lead' for mobile networks and personal devices, nor jusdging by our actions and expenditures even wanted it. Countries in the EU and Asia have always had more access to better faster personal devices and been more dependent on them. ..and thats fine. We'll be ok without a better version of a protocol that hardly anyone uses anyway.
pete-y
gauntlet down for yanks..Hopefully a US bus will be along in a minute. Don't want to share my intimate thought with Xi Jinping.
Karmudjun
The US had the lead at the turn of the millennia, and then gave up the ghost. Cost cutting measures reduced development across multiple disciplines. But we can all pretend America gave up the ghost.
Brian M
Wow just what the world wanted another protocol that won't be a world standard! Presume it won't be backwards compatible!
clay
And it comes with it's own back door for CCP coms. Nice.
Daishi
US companies need to be investing more into R&D on what is next or the Intellectual property of the next technologies is going to come from Huawei. Huawei makes huge investments into wireless and networking tech and standards. Blacklisting them will only do so much, US firms will need to show up get passed. The US government doesn't really invest in innovation so it is on tech companies to do it but when it comes to stuff like this most US tech companies aren't great at it. Apple is a notable exception.