3GPP continued development of the LTE standard, finalising Release 10 in September 2011. LTE-Advanced, or LTE-A focused on improving network capacity. The key new functionalities introduced were Carrier Aggregation (CA), enhanced use of multi-antenna techniques, and support for Relay Nodes (RN). LTE-A is often informally referred to as a "4.5G" network.

As a summary LTE Release 10, which we now call LTE-Advanced, provided the following technological enhancements:

• Increased peak data rate, DL 3 Gb/s, UL 1.5 Gb/s
• Higher spectral efficiency, from 16 b/s/Hz with 4x4 MIMO to 30 b/s/Hz with 8x8 MIMO
• Increased number of simultaneously active subscribers
• Improved performance at cell edges, e.g. for DL 2x2 MIMO at least 2.40 b/s/Hz/cell
• Up to 5C carrier aggregation (100 MHz total bandwidth)
• LTE Supplemental Downlink (SDL)