A review on mid-band and high-band 5G MIMO antenna designs: challenges and research directions

(2025) 2025:20 Dash et al. J Wireless Com Network https://doi.org/10.1186/s13638-025-02443-2 EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking Open Access REVIEW A review on mid‑band and high‑band 5G MIMO antenna designs: challenges and research directions Upali Aparajita Dash1, Arun Agarwal2* and Sasmita Pahadsingh3 *Correspondence: 1 KIIT Polytechnic, Bhubaneswar, Odisha 751024, India 2 Department of ECE, ITER, Faculty of Engineering & Technology, Siksha ‘O’ Anusandhan (Deemed to be University), Bhubaneswar, Odisha 751030, India 3 School of Electronics, KIIT Deemed to be University, Bhubaneswar, Odisha 751024, India Abstract Modern wireless communication demands 5G-enabled systems capable of handling high data rate and channel bandwidth. Recently, circular-polarized multiple-input–multiple-output technology in the user equipment has dragged attention of the designers. Antenna design involves complex mathematical formulations and assumptions of geometrical variables of structure and feeding methods. This task makes antenna design rigorous and time intensive. The authors have attempted to initialize design parameters that include, number and positioning of ports, shape and position of dielectric resonator antennas, usage of metasurface walls to attain high isolation, band width, gain, and efficiency. Scopus-indexed research papers have been carefully selected and reviewed to achieve the aforementioned purpose. Research papers on planar, dielectric resonator, circularly polarized dielectric resonators and metasurface-incorporated antennas have been organized and compared in different segments. The review may help in providing a definite direction of designing a MIMO antenna for either midband or high-band 5G communications. Keywords: Antenna, MIMO, DRA, Metasurface, Mid-band 5G, High-band 5G 1 Introduction Designing MIMO antennas for mid-band and high-band 5G communication involves addressing several technical challenges, including size limitations, efficient port configuration, and advanced feeding mechanisms. Compact antenna designs are essential due to the shorter wavelengths of these frequency bands, but miniaturization must not compromise performance in terms of isolation, efficiency, or impedance matching. Integrating multiple antennas within limited space, particularly in mobile devices, requires innovative solutions to mitigate cross-port interference and maximize channel capacity. Advanced techniques like dielectric resonator antennas (DRAs) and metasurfaces are increasingly utilized to enhance radiation efficiency, bandwidth, and overall performance. These approaches must be carefully balanced with material selection and manufacturing considerations to meet the stringent requirements of MIMO configurations specified by standards like IEEE 802.11, which demand robust performance at both the transmitting and receiving ends [1]. By leveraging diversity, © The Author(s) 2025. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. Dash et al. J Wireless Com Network (2025) 2025:20 MIMO systems improve signal strength and quality, enabling more robust and reliable RF links [2]. Circularly polarized (CP) MIMO-DRAs are particularly advantageous for maximizing network throughput, data speeds, and overall transmission performance [3]. Unlike traditional metallic antennas, which experience significant energy dissipation and inefficiencies at high frequencies, DRAs—constructed from ceramic-based materials—offer minimal conductor losses, resulting in higher radiation efficiency [4]. This paper reviews recent advancements in MIMO antenna designs tailored for 5G applications, focusing on DRAs and other techniques to optimize performance. It compares various configurations, including the integration of DRAs with microstrip patches, to achieve higher transmission speeds suitable for mid-band and high-band 5G. 2 Scope and opportunity To write the current review paper, the authors focused on articles with the keywords “MIMO antenna for 5G” in the search field. The filters were set to publications from 2018 onwards and limited to technical articles. Among the 65 articles initially identified, extensive screening was conducted to focus on MIMO antennas for 5G using dielectric resonator antennas (DRA), metasurface walls, or designed for millimeterwave (mmWave) or high-band applications. Ultimately, 31 articles matched the stated criteria. These articles were critically reviewed, and the findings are illustrated in both tabular and graphical formats. The review’s findings will help researchers save time when designing MIMO antennas suitable for mid-band or high-band 5G applications. The review focuses on MIMO-DRAs in the antenna domain for the 5G spectrum, as illustrated in Fig. 1. Scopus-indexed research papers meeting specific design criteria were critically analyzed. Key performance metrics such as compactness, bandwidth, gain, and efficiency were evaluated for each design. The summarized performance Fig. 1 Representing scope of the article for different applications. In the survey of the design of MIMO antenna using DRAs, the optimized dimension, gain, bandwidth of operation and efficiency can be compared for each model to decide a design protocol for further research works. The design protocol helps the grouping of antenna for specific 5G band operations covering numerous useful applications such as: Wi-Fi, WiMAX, WLAN, Bluetooth, UAV and satellites Page 2 of 18 Dash et al. J Wireless Com Network (2025) 2025:20 data provide valuable insights for developing design protocols across various application segments, including Wi-Fi, WiMAX, WLAN, Bluetooth, UAVs, and satellite communications. The review provides insights for selecting appropriate design sets suitable for midband and high-band antennas. Additionally, it highlights opportunities that extend beyond MIMO, addressing structural and dynamic paradigms related to NAMO, mmWave, and cognitive radio domains. As these designs find applications across di (...truncated)