Massive Machine Type Communication (mMTC) technologies are key to
addressing communication requirements of various emerging IoT
applications. In this work, a multisite mMTC test network is designed
and implemented in order to investigate the long-term communication
quality and sensor data of LoRa and NB-IoT. This is essential for remote
network maintenance operations, because it allows distinguishing
communication quality defects from software/hardware failures. Moreover,
it provides additional information about the communication link quality
for network management. The test network is geographically scattered
over a large area in Finland and experimented both in private and public
networks. Measurements on LoRaWAN test networks revealed that higher
SNRs and RSSIs are generally achieved for devices with lower spreading
factors. Comparison of NB-IoT and LoRaWAN shows that NB-IoT has better
communication quality performance. Overall, this paper provides first
long-term multi-site and multi-technology mMTC measurements and
corresponding performance analysis that are not available in the
existing literature.