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Comparative load testing against Open5GS

We use Open5GS as our example of a classic 5G core architecture, with multiple NFs and internal HTTP service based interface. Thanks to the authors of Open5GS for their awesome project: https://github.com/open5gs/open5gs.

Results

The QCore control plane is >30x faster than Open5GS at serial message processing and has a 30-50x smaller memory footprint.

This is based on measurements from the QCore load test, where

  • Open5GS's time to execute the test message sequence was ~34ms, using ~55% CPU, using 500MB-750MB resident memory
  • QCore's time to execute the test message sequence was ~1ms using around ~70% CPU, using ~15MB resident memory ...when confined to a single logical CPU (hyperhread).

The message rates observed in the test were

  • Open5GS: ~800 messages/sec
  • QCore: ~30k message/sec.

This is using an out-of-the-box Ubuntu install of Open5GS, compared to a standard release build of QCore. Open5GS was not tuned in any way.

The main time in Open5GS was spent in open5gs-scpd (19%), mongod (9%), open5gs-amfd (9%), open5gs-udmd (8%), and open5gs-smfd (8%). The main memory usage was in mongod (180MB) and open5gs-smfd (80-150MB).

Methodology

  • The test message sequence is a 27-message sequence of: registration, configuration update, session establishment, context release, service request, session release, deregistration.

    • A message means an NGAP message in either direction. In many cases it contains a transported NAS message.

  • The load test tool acts as a single gNB and loops repeatedly through 200 UEs running through the test message sequence for each UE serially.

  • The results above were measured on a single hyperthread of a 12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-1260P. The method used for confining the cores to a single hyperthread is given below.

  • The measurements quoted above are averaged over several runs.

  • The CPU measurements and memory use are approximate and taken from top (%CPU and RES). In the case of Open5GS, mongod usage was included in the quoted number but systemd-journal and rsyslogd were not.

Instructions

Install all configure Open5GS

  • Follow the instructions at https://open5gs.org/open5gs/docs/guide/01-quickstart/ to install MongoDB and Open5GS.
  • In /etc/open5gs/nrf.yaml, set mcc to 001 and mnc to 01
  • In /etc/open5gs/amf.yaml, set mcc and mnc as above (multiple places), and set the NGAP address to 127.0.0.1.

Confine Open5GS to a single CPU

To confine all Open5GS services to CPU 7:

sudo systemctl list-units --output=json 'open5gs*' | jq ".[].unit" | xargs -I{} sudo systemctl set-property {} AllowedCPUs=7
sudo systemctl set-property mongod AllowedCPUs=7
sudo systemctl restart "open5gs*"
sudo systemctl restart mongod

Provision SIMs

# Build QCore in release mode
cd ~/qcore
cargo build --release -p load-test

# Get Open5GS's dbctl script from github
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/open5gs/open5gs/refs/heads/main/misc/db/open5gs-dbctl
chmod +x open5gs-dbctl

# Generate 200 test SIMs in PLMN 00101.
./target/release/generate-load-test-sims > load_test_sims.toml

# Create a script for configuring Open5GS with these SIMs.
./target/release/provision-open5gs > provision-open5gs

# Run it - this takes a few 10s of seconds
sh provision-open5gs

Run top

Run top, enter f then use the cursor keys select P to show the CPU that the process are running on.

Run load test against Open5GS and qcore

# Run the load test against Open5GS
./target/release/load-test

# Stop Open5GS
sudo systemctl stop open5gs-amfd

# (Separate terminal) Run QCore
cd qcore
taskset --cpu-list 7 sudo ./target/release/qcore --local-ip 127.0.0.1 --ran-interface-name lo --sim-cred-file load_test_sims.toml > qcore.log 2>&1

# Run the load test against QCore
RUST_LOG=warn ./target/release/load-test

Open5GS debugging if needed

Best place to start is the AMF logs:

sudo tail -f /var/log/open5gs/amf.log