April 4, 2025 | Sensors |
Introduction: The rapid proliferation of Internet of Things (IoT) technologies in agriculture has generated a large and diverse body of research, yet the field lacks a comprehensive synthesis of which hardware platforms, communication protocols, and application domains have driven practical progress. This systematic review, conducted by researchers from the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute in Italy, addresses this gap through bibliometric and systematic analyses that map technology trends, leading contributing countries, and dominant communication technologies in IoT-based irrigation systems.
Key findings: Using a Web of Science dataset of 290 papers published between 2014 and 2024, the review shows rapid growth in IoT-based irrigation research, particularly between 2020 and 2022. India, China, the United States, Brazil, Italy, and Saudi Arabia were the leading contributors. The Arduino UNO remains the most widely used microcontroller unit, followed by the ESP8266, Raspberry Pi, ESP32, and ATmega328P. WiFi is the most frequently cited communication technology, while LoRa is emerging rapidly as a practical alternative for rural deployment because of its 10–15 km communication range, low power consumption, and cost-effectiveness. Remote monitoring and control is the dominant application area, followed by water-use optimization and soil moisture monitoring. The review also identifies persistent barriers, including the lack of standardization, compatibility challenges, rural connectivity limitations, and implementation costs, while highlighting the integration of IoT with artificial intelligence (AI), edge computing, and blockchain as a key future direction for enabling predictive and adaptive irrigation decision-making systems.
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Figure | Main applications of IoT in smart irrigation as reported from 2014 to 2024.
