At 3GPPs meeting last week in Singapore, Technical Specification Group (TSG) RAN #112 approved the full Release-21 timeline jointly proposed by the three TSG Chairs.  On June 12,  more than 150 participants from the regions ICT community attended ‘3GPP 6G Standardization: From Study to Specification,’ featuring the combined technical leadership of 3GPP. Topics covered in the summit included the 3GPP Chairs’ analysis of progress this week on 5G Advanced work items and 6G studies across the TSGs. There were also expert overviews on some key topics: AI/ML, ISAC, Massive MIMO evolution, NTN standards cooperation and security considerations for the 3GPP 6G System.

This formally completes the first 6G study item in 3GPP and sets the stage for the third quarter this year in which 3GPP working groups must settle numerous questions, including the migration architecture that network operators have wanted a decision on for over a year.  3GPP TSG RAN Chairman Younsun Kim, PhD, Samsung,  said during a joint session with the other two TSGs (SA and CT) that “no decisions were possible” on migration options, with input now hoped for at TSG RAN#113, scheduled for September 14–17, 2026 in Madrid, Spain.  Vodafone warned in a 3GPP contribution titled, “Good migration option decisions in September need hardware impacting decisions now!” that the September decision point only works if the plenary stopped deferring decisions.

Some achievements at this 3GPP Singapore meeting:

• Over 590 standards delegates welcomed by our Hosts to Singapore.
• Social events and a Singapore Industry summit on 3GPP held.
• Singapore Ministry and Government visitors welcomed as guests.
• All Work Items and Study Items for 5G‑Advanced on schedule in Release‑
• 14 Study Items for 6G progressing.
• The TSG RAN Study on 6G Scenarios and requirements (TR 38.914) approved this week.
• First timeline for early 6G specifications approved (Rel-21).

3GPP’s Release 21 will comprise the first 6G specs as well as 5G-Advanced.  Release 21 work items for 6G and 5G-Advanced are scheduled to be approved with a first functional freeze in March 2027 and a second freeze in June 2028, with a “checkpoint” in March 2028 for 80% of the work to be done. The stage 3 final freeze is set for December 2028. The full and final code freeze is scheduled for March 2029. 

Guy Daniels wrote in a blog post titled, “Analysis of 3GPP RAN #112: Timeline locked but the migration question unanswered“:

There is a 3GPP structural oddity in the details. The March 2027 6G “package approval” is the approval of a placeholder whose RAN2/3/4 content is finalized three months later. This is deliberate concurrency, not an oversight, it’s how the 3GPP works. The normative engineering windows are equally tight: RAN1 runs Q2 2027 to Q3 2028; RAN2/3/4 run Q3 2027 to Q4 2028; six quarters each to specify a new radio generation.”

“The Scenarios and Requirements study is finished, but the political questions it deferred are not. The requirements now say what 6G must do. September begins the fight over what it will be.”

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In a blog post summarizing last week’s plenary meeting, Ericsson said 6G standardization “is in full swing” and highlighted some of the early 6G decisions, including choices for waveform, modulation, channel coding, a basic security framework and supported bandwidths.  The agreed 6G waveform is to use cyclic-prefix orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (CP-OFDM) in the downlink. There are two options for uplink: CP-OFDM and discrete Fourier transform spread OFDM (DFT-s-OFDM).  Supported bandwidths will range from 3MHz to 400MHz. 3GPP also agreed that 5G channel codes “will be largely reused” in 6G. 

Here’s Ericsson’s timeline for 6G:

“6G is coming into focus…We are at a point now where a lot of pieces of the puzzle are starting to come together,” Gabriel Brown, senior principal analyst at Omdia, explained in a recent podcast with colleague and analyst Ruth Brown (no relation). The analysts also presented the 6G state of play at the 6G Summit hosted by ATIS’s Next G Alliance ahead of Network X Americas last month. Gabriel noted there has been a mindset shift among telcos about 6G from being “cautious” to “embracing it.”  He said that the World Radiocommunication Conference next year (WRC-27) and the Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 2028 will be important “checkpoints” for the anticipated early 2029 arrival of the 6G standards.

Addendum – 3GPP specs are NOT standards and have no legal standing:

What most, if not all, telecom trade publications (like this one) get completely wrong is that 3GPP does not produce standards, but specifications via their Releases. Those must be contributed, discussed, debated and approved by official SDOs like ITU-R and ETSI or other 3GPP members.  In the case of 5G/IMT 2020, ATIS presented all 3GPP RIT/SRIT specifications as contributions to ITU-R WP5D. 3GPP decided NOT to liaise/contribute their 5G SA core network architecture specs to ITU-T, but ETSI rubber stamped them.  It should also be noted that ITU-R WP 5D has sole responsibility for IMT 2030/6G Frequency Arrangements which will be done after 6G frequencies are agreed at the ITU World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC-27),which is scheduled to take place from October 18 to November 12, 2027, in Shanghai, China.

“The 3GPP Technical Specifications and Technical Reports have, in themselves, no legal standing. They only become “official” when transposed into corresponding publications of the Partner Organizations (or the national / regional standards body acting as publisher for the Partner). At this point, the specifications are referred to as UMTS within ETSI and FOMA within ARIB/TTC.”

https://portal.etsi.org/new3g/specs/publications_partners.htm

From Qualcomm:

“3GPP Organization – Fixing three common misconceptions:  3GPP develops technical specifications, not standards. This is a subtle, but important organizational clarification. 3GPP is an engineering organization that develops technical specifications. These technical specifications are then transposed into standards by the seven regional Standards Setting Organizations (SSOs) that form the 3GPP partnership.”

https://www.qualcomm.com/news/onq/2017/08/understanding-3gpp-starting-basics

3GPP Legal Status:

The Partnership Project is not a legal entity but is a collaborative activity between the following recognized Standards Development Organizations (SDO):

• The Association of Radio Industries and Businesses (ARIB) – Japan
• The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS) – US
• China Communications Standards Association (CCSA) – China
• The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) – Europe
• Telecommunications Standards Development Society (TSDSI) – India
• Telecommunications Technology Association (TTA) – South Korea
• Telecommunication Technology Committee (TTC) – Japan

The Partnership Project is entitled the “THIRD GENERATION PARTNERSHIP PROJECT” and may be known by the acronym “3GPP.”

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References:

https://www.3gpp.org/news-events/3gpp-news/tsg112#:~:text=3GPP%20plenaries

https://www.3gpp.org/news-events/3gpp-news/rel21-timeline

https://6gfutures.substack.com/p/analysis-of-3gpp-ran-112-timeline

https://www.ericsson.com/en/blog/2026/6/6g-standardization-key-milestones-and-ran-decisions

https://www.3gpp.org/about-us/legal-matters

https://portal.etsi.org/new3g/specs/publications_partners.htm

https://www.lightreading.com/6g/it-s-official-6g-specs-are-set-for-early-2029

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