Assessment of radio frequency fields in the 2.45 GHz band produced by smart home devices

Bioelectromagnetics. 2024 May;45(4):184-192. doi: 10.1002/bem.22492. Epub 2023 Nov 28.

Abstract

This paper describes the assessment of the electromagnetic fields produced by consumer "smart" devices used to control and monitor everyday equipment and appliances in a modern "smart" home. The assessment is based on the careful measurement of fields produced by a range of such devices in a laboratory environment configured to operate in a condition simulating high user activity. All devices included in this study operate in the 2.4 GHz band utilizing either Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connectivity. Overall results indicate very low levels of electromagnetic fields for all IoT smart devices in terms of human exposure safety standards (typically much less than 1%) with very low duty cycles (also less than 1%) resulting in even lower time-averaged exposure levels. These low levels of exposure, along with rapid reduction of levels with distance from the devices, suggests that the cumulative effect of multiple devices in a "smart" home are not significant.

Keywords: EMF; IoT; electromagnetic fields; human exposure; internet of things; smart devices; smart homes.

MeSH terms

  • Electromagnetic Fields*
  • Environmental Exposure* / analysis
  • Humans
  • Radio Waves
  • Reference Standards