The Boston IMS Steering Committee welcomes the microwave and RF community to the 2026 IEEE International MTT Symposium (IMS2026). This year’s event takes place from Sunday, 7 June, through Friday, 12 June, and features the RF Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Symposium, the RF Systems and Applications (RFSA) Symposium, the RF Technology and Techniques (RFTT) Symposium and the Automatic Radio Frequency Techniques Group (ARFTG) Microwave Measurements Conference. The technical presentations and industry exhibits will be held at the Thomas M. Menino Convention and Exhibition Center (MCEC). With over 8000 expected attendees, IMS2026 is sure to be a productive week of learning, networking and engagement with both colleagues and companies.
The IMS2026 tagline is “Revolutionizing RF,” which Boston has taken to heart. Several years in the making, IMS has undergone a rebranding, with new logos, a new unified website across all three constituent symposia, a new mobile app and, most excitingly, the restructuring of the technical program. The RFIC, RFSA and RFTT symposia will now mirror each other in organizational structure, with their own steering committees and paper selection, while maintaining a commonality that allows attendees to seamlessly focus on the technical topics most relevant to them. This reorganization allows IMS to continue to grow and evolve, with a new, increasing emphasis on RF systems and applications, alongside its traditional technical content on RF subsystems and components. The content of RFIC remains unchanged, making it a world-class venue for publishing integrated circuit results. Below is a list of the exciting changes for IMS2026.
- RFIC Symposium is unchanged from past years, with a focus on integrated circuit design and a critical technical anchor to the beginning of the week.
- RFSA Symposium focuses on integrating components and subsystems within the constraints of available signal-processing techniques and digital processing hardware, driving innovation in communication and sensing systems and applications. This year, RFSA has a special focus on integrated sensing and communications (ISAC).
- RFTT Symposium focuses on the design of component technology within the constraints of electromagnetics and manufacturing limitations, driving innovation in filters, passive circuits, heterogeneous packaging, semiconductor devices and active circuit technologies. This year, RFTT has a special focus on quantum technology.
- New IMS Joint RFSA/RFTT Plenary Session fireside chat format.
- Unification of the Industry and Student paper competitions across RFIC, RFSA and RFTT, with finalists notified before the symposia and highlighted at the RFIC and IMS Showcases.
- Introduction of the RFSA RF Systems Dialogue (formerly the Future G Summit).
- New RF Systems Pavilion on the exhibition floor with cross-vendor demonstrations of communications and sensing systems.
- Introduction of Thursday RFSA Workshops that do not overlap with RFSA technical sessions.
- New IMS Bootcamp on Phased Arrays focusing on RF systems aspects.
- Re-introduction of the post-deadline paper submission for RFSA and RFTT to capture high-quality, late-breaking technical results for the broader IMS audience.
Despite these new features, the overall format of the week remains largely the same.
The RFIC Symposium begins on Sunday evening with a plenary, followed by the RFIC Reception. RFSA and RFTT share a joint IMS Plenary on Monday evening, followed by the IMS Welcome Reception at View Boston in Back Bay. The RFIC technical sessions are Monday and Tuesday, the RFSA technical sessions are Tuesday and Wednesday, and the RFTT technical sessions are Tuesday through Thursday.
As usual, the ARFTG Microwave Measurements Conference will have technical sessions on Friday. Workshops will start on Sunday with RFIC technical content, followed by RFSA and RFTT workshops on Monday, with select RFSA workshops now on Thursday. Additionally, as part of RFSA, we are introducing the RF Systems Dialogue that will take place on Tuesday afternoon and will not overlap with RFSA technical sessions. The focus of this year’s RF Systems Dialogue will be ISAC and feature invited speakers, followed by an evening panel session with light refreshments.
In a nod to the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics, both the RFIC Plenary and the IMS Plenary will have a quantum theme. RFIC will feature two speakers, IBM Quantum’s CTO Oliver Dial on Quantum Technology and UCLA’s Asad Abidi on the Evolution of RFIC design. The IMS (RFSA/RFTT) Plenary will feature a new fireside chat format with Nobel Prize Winner John Martinis from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Qolab, in which he will discuss the engineering challenges over the last 40 years in bringing quantum computing into the mainstream.
The IMS Industry Exhibition is a centerpiece of the week and will take place as usual from Tuesday through Thursday. This will feature 500+ exhibitors and over 850 booths to showcase the latest developments in microwave hardware, software, components and systems. The exhibit floor also features the MicroApps Theater, the Societies’ Pavilion, the Start-up Pavilion and the new RF System Pavilion that will showcase collaborative, multi-vendor demonstrations of communication and RF sensing systems.
Evenings throughout the week will be filled with social and networking opportunities, both organized and informal, so that you can catch up with colleagues from across the globe. The 2026 RFIC and IMS (RFSA/RFTT) Welcome Receptions will be held on Sunday and Monday evening in the MCEC Ballroom and View Boston, respectively. Tuesday evening will feature the Amateur Radio Social, the Young Professionals Social Event and the Women in Microwaves Reception. Wednesday evening will be the MTT-S Awards Banquet, where conference and MTT Society awards are handed out and the newest IEEE Fellows are honored. Additionally, there are dozens of restaurants and night spots within walking distance of the MCEC and the IMS2026 hotels for informal and private gatherings.
For more information and to register visit: https://ims-ieee.org. We look forward to seeing everyone in Boston for IMS2026!