A PROPAGATION STUDY OF XBEE P2P LINKS FOR SHORT-RANGE IOT APPLICATIONS IN OUTDOOR ENVIRONMENTS AT 868 MHZ

This study presents a preliminary propagation analysis for short-range point-to-point (P2P) wireless communication employing XBee modules operating at the 868 MHz in outdoor environments. In order to facilitate straightforward planning and deployment of XBee P2P links in the context of short-range Internet of Things (IoT) applications, empirical measurements were conducted under line-of-sight (LOS) conditions in urban, suburban, and rural environments. The performance of five well-known empirical path loss models, including Free Space Path Loss (FSPL), Two-Ray Ground Reflection, Log-distance, Hata-Okumura, and Cost231-Hata, was then evaluated based on Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) data. The findings indicate that the FSPL model demonstrates the highest level of accuracy in rural areas, while the Log-distance model exhibits better performance in urban and suburban contexts. In contrast, the Two-Ray and Cost231-Hata models demonstrate a comparatively limited degree of agreement with the measured data across all environments. It is expected that these findings may offer valuable insights for the simple deployment of energy-efficient and cost-effective XBee-based P2P networks in outdoor IoT settings.