Transparent Antennas for 5G Wireless Connectivity: Bridging Aesthetics and Performance

Transparent antennas integrate seamlessly with surfaces such as glass, offering aesthetic and functional benefits. However, there is a gap in the literature regarding their practical evaluation when integrated into an end-to-end 5G system. To bridge this gap, we demonstrate the performance of a transparent dipole antenna on glass compared to a conventional antenna in the C-band. We establish an end-to-end link in controlled 5G tests using OpenAirInterface5G as the gNB and a 5G Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS) User Equipment (UE). Physical layer metrics such as Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) and Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP) as well as application-layer metrics such as uplink and downlink throughput demonstrate performance comparable to conventional antennas.

IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM 2025)