IEEE 802.3 Standard for Ethernet

IEEE 802.3, 802.3at, bt, af, … IEEE numbers can be a bit confusing. In this article we focus on the numbers of the IEEE Standards for Ethernet.

IEEE – the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers – started as an American organization of engineers. By now, it has become a global organization.

In IEEE 802.3, IEEE specifies all the differen Ethernet versions. The current complete edition dates of July 2022 as has 7.023 pages. As Ethernet continues to evolve, IEEE regularly publishes amendments of this standard. Each amendment is numbered “IEEE 802.3“ with a suffix of two letters so each amendment can be clearly identified. The first amendments just had one letter which led to a total amount of 26 amendments (IEEE 802.3 a to IEEE 802.3z). After that, to letters were added as a suffix: IEEE 802.3aa to IEEE 802.3az, then IEEE 802.3ba to IEEE 802.3bz, and so on.

The first amendment for Power over Ethernet, for example, that was published in 2003 was assigned the number IEEE 802.3 af, the amendment that also covered the stronger version Power over Ethernet Plus was assigned IEEE 802.3at and the latest version Four-pair Power over Ethernet is specified in amendment IEEE 802.3bt.

All the amendments will become part of the next complete edition. The numbers with the letters will then become obsolete for those amendments, however they are still used in the field to identify certain issues or facts, e.d. “Power over Ethernet Plus according to IEEE 802.3at“.

Certain IEEE 802 standards can be downloaded at no cost after they have been published for at least six months as PDF files in the IEEE GET Program, which is great for students, universities and journalist. The IEEE GET program can be reached under https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/browse/standards/get-program/page/  (last accessed on October 23rd, 2023).