IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL.

2, 2003 143

Compact Internal Multiband Antennas for

Mobile Handsets
Yong-Xin Guo, Member, IEEE, Irene Ang, and M. Y. W. Chia, Member, IEEE

Abstract—A novel compact internal quad-band handset

antenna for covering the GSM900, DCS1800, PCS1900, and
ISM2450 bands is presented. The proposed antenna consists of
folded patches sharing a common shorting strip and occupies
a total volume of 36 16 9 mm3 . Details of the antenna
are discussed along with measured and simulated results. The
simulation is based on the finite-difference time-domain method.
Index Terms—Antennas, internal antennas, multiband an-
tennas, planar inverted-F antennas (PIFA), small antennas.

I. INTRODUCTION

T HE rapid growth in mobile communication system leads

to a great demand in developing small size antenna with
multiband functions. Internal antennas have several advan-
tages over conventional monopole-like antenna for mobile
handsets. They are less prone to damage, compact in total
size and aesthetic from the appearance point of view. Hence, (a)
small and low profile structures such as planar inverted-F
antennas (PIFA) that can be mounted on portable equipment
are becoming very attractive for mobile communications [1],
[2]. Many new multiband designs based on PIFA concepts
for achieving operation at two or more of the GSM900,
DCS1800, PCS1900, UMTS2000, and ISM2450 bands have
been reported in the open literatures [2]–[13]. In this letter a
novel compact internal PIFA for quad-band operation covering
the GSM900, DCS1800, PCS1900, and ISM2450 bands is
presented. The proposed antenna consists of folded patches
sharing a common shorting strip and occupies a total volume of
. The simulations performed utilize Remcom
(b)
software XFDTD5.3, which is based on the finite-difference
time-domain (FDTD) method. Fig. 1. Geometry of the proposed antenna (a) 3-D view and (b) side view A.

II. ANTENNA DESIGN AND STRUCTURE
Fig. 1 shows the proposed antenna mounted on a ground plane
of dimensions 80 mm 36 mm. The antenna comprises a main
plate in the top layer, a ground plane in the bottom layer, two
folded arms in-between, a short-circuited strip, and a feed strip.
The structure is supported by foam. The main plate is directly
shorted to the ground plane by means of the shorting strip and
fed via a feed strip connected to a 50- transmission line etched
on the back of the ground plane. A rectangular slit is made in
the main patch to divide it into two parts so as to generate a
Manuscript received March 27, 2003; revised April 30, 2003.
The authors are with the Institute for Infocomm Research, TeleTech Park,
Science Park II, Singapore 117674 (e-mail: yxguo@ieee.org).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LAWP.2003.815278
1536-1225/03$17.00 © 2003 IEEE
dual-frequency characteristic. By adding the two folded arms,
two additional resonators for the GSM1800 and PCS1900 bands
can be introduced, which can be clearly observed from the sim-
ulated return losses of the antennas with or without the two ad-
ditional arms as depicted in Fig. 2. Referring to Fig. 2, it is
seen that the additional arms 1 and 2 devote to the GSM1800
and PCS1900 bands, respectively. Moreover, the resonant fre-
quency of the lower band GSM900 can be reduced significantly
by the introduction of the arm 2. The impedance matching for
the GSM1800 band is mainly controlled by the length L21 of the
arm 1 and the distance between the main plate and the folded
arm, D1. The capacitive load of the folded arm 2 can be used
for finely-tuning the low band GSM900 and the second high
band PCS1900. These techniques allow us to achieve quad-band
operation without having to increase the overall size of the an-
tenna. The antenna has dimensions of length of 36 mm, width of
144
Fig. 2. Simulated return losses of the antennas with or without folded arms 1
and 2.
16 mm and total height of 9 mm. A prototype was constructed
and measured.
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
The antenna has dimensions of
, , , ,
, ,
, , , ,
and . The widths of the shorting pin and the feed
strip are 3 mm. Fig. 3 shows the simulated and measured
return losses for the main-plate antenna with folded arm 2
only. Triple-band operation can be obtained. The measured
bandwidths according to 6 dB return loss are 68 MHz
(0.945 1.013 GHz) at the low band, 260 MHz (1.765 2.025
GHz) at the first high band and 130 MHz (2.42 2.55 GHz) at
the second high band. The measured and simulated results are
in good agreement. Fig. 4 exhibits the simulated and measured
return losses for the antenna with both folded arms 1 and 2. The
measured bandwidths are approximately 70 MHz (0.942 1.012
GHz) at the low band, 350 MHz (1.665 2.015 GHz) at the first
high band and 105 MHz (2.5 2.605 GHz) at the second high
band. The corresponding simulated bandwidths are 66 MHz
(0.972 1.038 GHz) at the low band, 286 MHz (1.744 2.028
GHz) at the first high band and 78 MHz (2.548 2.624 GHz) at
the second high band. Again, simulation and measurement are
in good agreement except for glitch at the first high band. This
could be due to the slight discrepancy between the experiment
and simulation. Regarding the simulated first high band, the
two resonant frequencies are very close, resulting in only
one dip being observed other than two adjacent dips for the
measurement case. The obtained bandwidths are able to cover
the bandwidth requirements for mobile handsets operating at
the GSM900, DCS1800, PCS1900, and ISM2450 bands. The
frequencies of the proposed prototype are about 5% higher than
the standard communication spectrum. This is to account for
the effect of the plastic casing over the antenna as in [6].
Fig. 5(a)–(c) plots the measured plane radiation pattern
at 980, 1900, and 2550 MHz, respectively. Moreover, good om-
nidirectional radiation patterns were also obtained in the
IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 2, 2003
Fig. 3. Simulated and measured return losses for the antenna with folded arm
2 only.
,
,
Fig. 4. Simulated and measured return loss for the antenna with both folded
arms 1 and 2.
plane for all the three resonant frequencies, which are not shown
for brevity. They are similar to those of other integrated antennas
for mobile handsets [1], [2]. The measured maximum gains for
the antenna with both arms 1 and 2 are 0.7, 2.4, and 1.2 dBi at
980, 1900, and 2550 MHz, respectively. Note that the low gain
at 980 MHz may be due to its relatively electric-thin substrate
compared with the higher gains at 1900 and 2550 MHz bands.
Referring to Fig. 5(a)–(c), the overall shape of the radiation pat-
terns can be suitable for mobile communications terminals.
IV. PARAMETERS STUDY
In order to optimize the antenna’s performance, some key pa-
rameters are varied to analyze the structure. Throughout the pa-
rameter study, the overall size of the antenna will remain un-
changed.
The first variation was performed by adjusting the distance
D1. As seen in Fig. 6, reducing the distance D1 will merge the
first and second high resonant frequencies to form a wide band-
width with a negligible effect on the low band and the third high
band. On the other hand, varying the distance between the main
plate and the folded arm 2 as in Fig. 7 will mainly affect the low
band and the third high band.
GUO et al.: COMPACT INTERNAL MULTIBAND ANTENNAS FOR MOBILE HANDSETS 145

(a)

Fig. 6. Variation of the distance between the main plate and the folded arm 1
(simulated).

(b)

Fig. 7. Variation of the distance between the main plate and the folded arm 2
(simulated).

(c)
Fig. 5. Measured radiation patterns for the proposed antenna at the x-z plane.

Adjusting the length of L21 can be used to control the band-

width for the PCS1900 band. In Fig. 8, it is observed that short-
ening L21 can shift up the first high resonance to merge with
the second high resonance forming a wide bandwidth. The gap
of G11 is varied with W12 fixed at 3 mm, while W11 and W21
change accordingly. Fig. 9 shows that increasing the gap will
shift down the low band and broaden the bandwidth of the third
high band. As shown in Fig. 10, by widening W12 with G11
fixed at 2 mm and changing W21 accordingly, it is seen that
the bandwidth of the third high band becomes wider, while the
bandwidth of the first high band becomes narrower. Regarding
Fig. 10, it is also observed that widening W12 will shift down
Fig. 8. Variation of the length L21 (simulated).
the low band and shift up the first high band with a negligible
effect on the second high band.
Moreover, we have also studied the effects of L11 and H31
on the impedance matching, which are not shown for brevity.
By increasing the length of L11, the low band and the third high
band will shift up with a negligible effect on the first and second
146 IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 2, 2003

V. CONCLUSION
In this paper, a compact internal antenna for quad-band opera-
tion at the GSM900, DCS1800, PCS1900, and ISM2450 bands
has been proposed. A good agreement between measurement
and simulation has been obtained. The simulation is based on
the FDTD method. Parametric study has also been carried out
to further understand the performance of the antenna.

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