What is radio testing?

Radio testing, or radio frequency testing, assesses radio equipment to ensure there is no interference with the devices and users of the nearby RF environment.  

Why is radio testing important?

Radio testing is required to demonstrate compliance to most worldwide markets. Depending on the market / region, various compliance regimes are in place and are required to be followed to allow placing on that market compliant radio equipment. Radio equipment testing ensures that a device efficiently uses radio spectrum and does not interfere with other radio spectrum users.

How we can help 

Kiwa Electrical Compliance has vast experience in ensuring legal compliance to meet local wireless regulations and our knowledgeable engineers are experts in radio/wireless product testing, including RF design troubleshooting, certifications/approvals and antenna testing.

Our product testing can help you meet key requirements to support the UKCA marking under the UK Radio Equipment Regulations, CE marking in Europe under the Radio Equipment Directive (RED) 2014/53/EU, FCC (USA) and ISED (Canada). Many other countries can be covered with the same standards, so please make contact for advice on specific countries.

Radio technologies 

Our testing covers many common radio technologies used in a wide range of products. These radio technologies include:

  • Bluetooth – Classic (with EDR) and Low Energy
  • Wi-Fi – 2.4 and 5 GHz WLAN
  • ZigBee – DSSS (Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum) & LoRaWAN (Long-Range Wide-Area Network)
  • Short Range Devices (SRD) – Including Z-Wave, RFID (Radio-Frequency Identification), Induction Loop, Land Mobile Service (Analogue and Digital), NFC (Near-field Communication)
  • mmWave (Millimetre Wave) – Including wireless systems such as mmWave backhaul
  • Satellite Positioning – GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System)
  • GPS and Cellular Technologies – Including GSM 2G/3G/LTE/4G in base stations and repeaters
  • Private Mobile Radio (PMR) – This is also a requirement for marine radio and fixed link equipment

Our radio testing services include:

  • UKAS accredited radiated and conducted emissions testing up to 231 GHz
  • Compliance and fully accredited Radio testing
  • Initial Assessment (Pre-compliance Radio testing)
  • Development testing
  • Experienced engineers provide you with on-the-spot advice and solutions to achieve and maintain compliance
  • Certifications/Approvals
  • Design stage solutions
  • Radio Performance Evaluation
  • Antenna Testing
  • Gap Analysis
  • Testing and certification of Digital TV and Radio Products through one service

Our laboratory is:

  • A UKAS accredited testing laboratory No. 2360 to ISO 17025:2017
  • Accredited by the FCC for the US market (Registration No.293246) and ISED (formerly Industry Canada) in Canada (registered under site Nos. 5612A-1, 5612A-2, 5612A-3 and 5612A-4)
  • Recognised as a Conformity Assessment Body (CAB) by the FCC (USA)
  • Designated to perform compliance testing on equipment subject to SDoC under Parts 15B and 18 of the FCC’s Rules

Common tests

We conduct a multitude of transmitter and receiver tests including but not limited to:

Transmitter tests
  • RF Output Power
  • Power Spectral Density
  • Spectrum Emission Mask
  • Occupied Channel Bandwidth
  • Frequency Stability / Error
  • Radiated Band Edge
  • Duty Cycle
  • Modulation Bandwidth
  • Transmitter unwanted emissions in the out-of-band or spurious Domain
Receiver tests
  • Sensitivity
  • Adjacent Channel / Frequency Band Selectivity
  • Receiver Spurious Emissions
  • Receiver Intermodulation
  • Blocking

Radio Equipment Directive / Regulations & Certification

 

Radio Equipment Directive (2014/53/EU)

The Radio Equipment Directive (2014/53/EU) has been in force since June 2016. From June 2017 onwards Radio Equipment placed on the European Market must comply with the Radio Equipment Directive (RED).

If you are a Radio Equipment manufacturer, importer or distributor then the Radio Equipment Directive is the only route for radio devices to be placed onto the European Market fully replacing the R&TTE Directive from 13 June 2017.

Radio Equipment Regulations

Compliance with the Radio Equipment Regulations for UKCA marking will be required, however in most cases it will be possible to use CE marking until 31 December 2024. From 31 December 2024 the UKCA mark is to be used. A Declaration of Conformity (DoC) is also required to be drawn up to UK Radio Equipment Regulations.

Certification with the FCC / ISED

Electrical equipment marketed in the USA and Canada requires authorisation. There are two authorisation routes, SDoC and Certification. We can support these routes to compliance, including certification with the FCC and / or ISED.

View the full details of the Radio and EMC standards we test to, or get in touch to learn more about radio testing and certifications and see how Kiwa Electrical Compliance can help you.