Distance measurement range improvements

[KIS]

Hello!

I have been testing the distance measurement functionality on the nRF52832, and it performs up to approximately 10–12 meters in an office environment. Switching to RTT ranging modes extends the maximum range to about 18 meters, but the distance measurements fluctuate significantly and become less accurate. The output power has been set to the maximum of +4 dBm.

Test is using the nRF52832 based development kits. One device is always in the same location during all tests. Standard distance measurement example code, SDK v2.9.0.

In the same office environment, standard BLE communication using the same chipset reaches up to 30-40 meters.

Is there a way to improve the performance of distance measurement to achieve similar or better ranges? What modifications would be required to the default distance measurement example provided in the SDK?

Thank You!

[Kenneth]

Hello,

You can find an webinar that discuss different distance measurement techniques here:
https://webinars.nordicsemi.com/events/12113618787 

Note that after this webinar was done, we are now working on a new feature in BLE called channel sounding, this will only be available on the nRF54L-series though:
https://docs.nordicsemi.com/bundle/ncs-latest/page/nrfxlib/softdevice_controller/doc/channel_sounding.html 

Kenneth