Many people can’t tell the difference between LoRaWAN and LoRa.
LoRaWAN refers to the MAC layer networking protocol, while LoRa is a physical layer protocol. Although most existing LoRaWAN networks use LoRa as the physical layer, the LoRaWAN protocol also lists that GFSK can be used as the physical layer in certain frequency bands. From the perspective of network layering, LoRaWAN can normally use any physical layer protocol, and LoRa can also be used as the physical layer of other networking technologies.
Lora
LoRa is one of the LPWAN communication technologies. It is an ultra-long-distance wireless transmission scheme based on spread spectrum technology selected and promoted by the American Semtech company. This solution changes the previous tradeoff between transmission distance and power consumption to better provide users with a simple system that can achieve long distance, long battery life, and large capacity, thereby expanding the sensor network. Now, LoRa mainly operates in free frequency bands around the world, including 433/868/915MHz, etc.
LoRaWAN
LoRaWAN is an open standard that defines the communication protocol for LPWAN technology based on LoRa chips. LoRaWAN defines media access control (MAC) at the data link layer and is protected by the LoRa Alliance. This difference between LoRa and LoRaWAN is important because other companies like Link Labs use a proprietary MAC layer on top of the LoRa chip to create better hybrid designs, called Symphony Link in Link Labs’ case.
LoRaWAN is a star or star-to-star topology that is generally considered better than mesh networks due to its advantages in preserving battery power and increasing communication scale. Specifically, a star topology relays information through gateways to a central server, with each end node transmitting data to multiple gateways. The gateway then forwards the data to the network server, where redundancy detection, security viewing and message dispatching are performed.
Overall, LoRa only includes the link layer protocol and is very suitable for P2P communication between nodes; LoRaWAN also includes the network layer, so it can send information to any base station connected to the cloud channel. LoRaWAN modules are able to operate at different frequencies simply by connecting the correct antenna to its socket.