L96 PCB Layout Question

k7S29 · May 26, 2026, 8:27pm

Hey all!

I am currently working on an educational project, where I am using an L96 Chip Antenna module for GNSS.

In the current design I had to place a rather large ground pad (for an 18650 battery holder) on the other side of the board. I am pretty sure that this badly influences the receiption. I was able to get a fix in an open field after around 10 minutes and the fix was sometimes stable during movement but had quite some dropouts in between.

I can only upload one attachment due to the forum rules, but basically in the current layout, the module is aligned vertically and the keep-out-zone is right above the PCB cutout at the top and the GND (2) pin starts directly below the keepout zone.

Below image is how I would change the layout; Rotate the Module 90° to the left and move it further down (I would move it even further down, the image is just for clarity), but that would mean that the module is oriented vertically and 90 degrees facing to the left. Is that a bad idea?

Lastly one thing I could imagine is use a module with an external antenna, where I could mount the antenna directly inside the top of the case where it is horizontally aligned, but in that case I would want a module where I can just plug in an antenna and don’t have to do any RF traces on the PCB myself - does Quectel have such a product in line?

Thanks in advance and BR,
Jakob

mohamad.firdaus · May 28, 2026, 1:54am

Hi @k7S29 can you share your PCB design to this email: mohamad.firdaus@quectel.com for review.

Best regards,

k7S29 · May 28, 2026, 2:48pm

I have sent you the email - sometimes they land in spam

mohamad.firdaus · May 29, 2026, 8:31am

Hi @k7S29

Based on your new changes on the layout, it not a bad design but instead a good move as you will need carefully look as any component is not allowed under the keep out area. The distance between the edge of the module and the nearest ground plane edge should be maintained at a minimum of 10 mm.

Another item that you will look into is, if your PCB design was based on 4-layers, please make sure the 2nd layer is the GND plane. This will ensure to isolate the power supply (the battery 18650) from other signals using ground to prevent interference.

You also may refer from this documentation:

To use external antenna, based on your design, you already made this as Internal Antenna typical design where connect the RF_IN to RF_OUT. However, this was missing 0R as below:

If to add external antenna capability, you may need to follow as below design (your design did not use ANTON):

Active Antenna:

Passive Antenna:

Once your have this design, you can use with external antenna. Hopefully these information helps!
Best Regards,