School of Specs Ambient IoT — a tag with no batteryOverview

Where it stands and how to follow it · chapter 6 of 7 · 5 minutes

6 Where the work stands

Nineteen of 37 items at 100 per cent, every study but one finished, phase 2 still running — and what a completion percentage does and does not tell you.

6.1 The headline, and what it is made of

Nineteen of the 37 Ambient IoT work items and study items stand at 100 per cent complete. [1]

The evidence for that is narrow and worth naming before anything is built on it. Those nineteen are the rows of the 3GPP Work Plan whose completion field reads 100 per cent, in a file this machine holds a copy of.

The weight of the work sits in Rel-19, which carries 8200 of the documents [2]. Rel-20 carries 2176 [3] and Rel-18 just 179 [4].

The newest Ambient IoT document in this data was filed 2026-07-30, so nothing here reflects anything decided after that day. [5]

6.2 The studies: nine of ten finished

Study Release Complete Finished
FS_Ambient_IoT_RAN FS_Ambient_IoT_RAN Rel-18 100% 2023-09-08
FS_AmbientIoT, SA1 FS_AmbientIoT Rel-19 100% 2023-05-28
FS_AmbientIoT, SA2 FS_AmbientIoT Rel-19 100% 2024-08-30
FS_Ambient_IoT_solutions FS_Ambient_IoT_solutions Rel-19 100% 2024-12-12
FS_Ambient_IoT_Sec FS_Ambient_IoT_Sec Rel-19 100% 2024-12-12
FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_ARC FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_ARC Rel-20 100% 2026-03-03
FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_APP FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_APP Rel-20 100% 2026-06-06
FS_AIoT_SEC_Ph2 FS_AIoT_SEC_Ph2 Rel-20 100% 2026-06-06
FS_Ambient_IoT_Outdoor_Active FS_Ambient_IoT_Outdoor_Active Rel-20 100% 2026-03-03
FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_CH FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_CH Rel-20 0% target 2026-12-12

Every Rel-19 study is done, and three of the four Rel-20 studies are done as well. The one at zero is the phase 2 charging study, approved only at plenary SP-112 — it has barely begun. FS_AmbientIoT_Ph2_CH SP-260656

6.3 Rel-19 normative work: all but two

Work item Group Complete Finished
AmbientIoT, stage 1 AmbientIoT SA1 100% 2023-12-12
Ambient_IoT_Solutions-Core Ambient_IoT_Solutions-Core RAN1 100% 2025-09-09
Ambient_IoT_Solutions-Perf Ambient_IoT_Solutions-Perf RAN4 100% 2026-03-03
AmbientIoT-ARC AmbientIoT-ARC SA2 100% 2025-09-09
AmbientIoT-CH AmbientIoT-CH SA5 100% 2025-06-06
AmbientIoT-CT, CT1 part AmbientIoT-CT CT1 100% 2025-09-09
AmbientIoT-CT, CT3 part AmbientIoT-CT CT3 100% 2025-09-09
AmbientIoT-CT, CT4 part AmbientIoT-CT CT4 100% 2025-09-09
AmbientIoT-SEC AmbientIoT-SEC SA3 95% target 2025-09-09
conformance testing Ambient_IoT_Solutions_plus_CT1_SA3-ConTest RAN5 37% target 2026-12-11

The one piece clearly still running is conformance testing, which started on 2025-12-12 and is about a third done. Ambient_IoT_Solutions_plus_CT1_SA3-ConTest

The security item at 95 per cent is the more interesting row. Its target finish is 2025-09-09, which has passed, and the figure has not moved to 100. The data does not say whether five per cent of work remains or whether five per cent of paperwork does. AmbientIoT-SEC

6.4 Rel-20 phase 2: running, not finished

Work item Group Complete Target finish
AmbientIoT_Ph2-ARC AmbientIoT_Ph2-ARC SA2 70% 2026-09-09
AmbientIoT_Ph2-APP AmbientIoT_Ph2-APP SA6 70% 2026-09-09
Ambient_IoT_Solutions_Ph2-Core Ambient_IoT_Solutions_Ph2-Core RAN1 40% 2027-03-03
AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT, CT4 part AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT CT4 30% 2027-03-03
AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT, CT6 part AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT CT6 30% 2027-03-03
AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT, CT1 part AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT CT1 20% 2027-03-03
AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT, CT3 part AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT CT3 20% 2027-03-03
AmbientIoT_Ph2-OAM AmbientIoT_Ph2-OAM SA5 20% 2027-03-03
Ambient_IoT_Solutions_Ph2-Perf Ambient_IoT_Solutions_Ph2-Perf RAN4 0% 2027-09-09
AmbientIoT_Ph2-SEC AmbientIoT_Ph2-SEC SA3 0% 2026-12-12
AmbientIoT_Ph2_APP-CT AmbientIoT_Ph2_APP-CT CT3 0% 2027-03-03

The order in that table is the order of the chain: architecture and application enablement ahead, radio behind them, protocols and management behind those, and performance and security not started.

6.5 What a percentage does not mean

Three cautions, and each is the difference between reading this record and inventing from it.

  • A percentage is a target's progress, not an outcome. It says how far a work plan row claims the work has got, not what was decided or shipped.

  • It is as fresh as its last edit, and no fresher. A row records when it was last modified; it does not record whether anything has moved since. An item at 20 per cent may have moved on and simply not been updated. AmbientIoT_Ph2-OAM

  • Two rows about the same work can disagree. The umbrella item Ambient_IoT_Solutions stands at 80 per cent while both parts under it — core and performance — stand at 100. The data does not say which is right. Ambient_IoT_Solutions Ambient_IoT_Solutions-Core Ambient_IoT_Solutions-Perf

6.6 A last caution about the counts

Two gaps sit under every date and release figure in this course. Some of the 10771 Ambient IoT documents carry no upload date, and some carry no release. [6]

So "4457 filed in 2025" counts only the rows that do carry a date [7], and "in Rel-19" only the rows that carry a release. That does not make them wrong; it makes them floors rather than totals.

6.7 Where to read this yourself

The status of a work item is settled in its own description document. Four of those sit behind the tables above.

RP-252105 for the RAN normative work, SP-250377 for architecture, SP-251196 for the security revision, RP-253381 for conformance testing. RP-252105 SP-250377 SP-251196 RP-253381

The phase 2 architecture study's report is TR 23.700-30, and the phase 2 security study's is TR 33.714. TR 23.700-30 TR 33.714

This school does not carry the text of those documents, and it carries no opinion about what the percentages will do next.

Where the numbers in this chapter come from

  1. 19 of the 37 work items stand at 100% Work Plan rows of the Ambient IoT work items whose completion field is 1.0, read 2026-08-04
  2. 8200 Ambient IoT documents in Rel-19 Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc` whose release column is Rel-19, read 2026-08-04
  3. 2176 Ambient IoT documents in Rel-20 Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc` whose release column is Rel-20, read 2026-08-04
  4. 179 Ambient IoT documents in Rel-18 Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc` whose release column is Rel-18, read 2026-08-04
  5. the newest Ambient IoT document was filed 2026-07-30 latest upload date over the Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc`, read 2026-08-04
  6. 10771 Ambient IoT documents rows of `tdoc` in api.sqlite whose work item column names one of the 28 Ambient IoT work item acronyms, read 2026-08-04
  7. 4457 Ambient IoT documents filed in 2025 Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc` whose upload date falls in 2025, read 2026-08-04

Every source this course is built on

Check yourself

Answers appear when you pick one, with where they come from.

Q6.1 How many of the 37 work items stand at 100 per cent complete?

Q6.2 Which of the ten studies is not finished?

Q6.3 What is a completion percentage in this data actually a reading of?

Q6.4 The umbrella item Ambient_IoT_Solutions stands at 80 per cent while both parts under it stand at 100. What does the data say about that?

Q6.5 Which piece of Rel-19 work is clearly still running?

This chapter was built from a source register generated 2026-08-04. A fresher build of the register may hold different numbers.