Low-power wide-area network (LPWAN)

LPWAN is a type of wireless network designed to work in wide areas at very low bitrates, which means that the exchange in this type of network is really small.

LPWAN uses low-power, low-bitrate, and low-frequency devices that are very powerful when used to connect to things. This is because it enables the use of long-lasting batteries and smaller devices. But there are still many restrictions, such as small data payloads or a limited number of messages per day.

Having lower frequencies allows an LPWAN to be very reliable and unsusceptible to interference, even when propagating messages for very large ranges. LPWAN providers normally have a limit for the number of messages sent in the network. There are many providers of LPWANs, and the most famous of these is probably Sigfox. 

LPWANs do not have a direct connection from the device or gateway to the internet. Instead, they usually have a pre-provisioned network, where at one end of the network you will have the devices and at the other end you would have a number of web hooks and functions that allow you to connect to your application or platform:

Different from a cellular network, LPWAN networks do not provide internet connection to the devices, instead they provide means to create triggers on events received from the devices to the network. As an example, you can create an application and a trigger at the edge of the LPWAN provider network to the internet that whenever a data event is received from a device, it calls a service available at the internet with given data from the even published by the device.