  The use of Bluetooth Low Energy in low-range Internet of Things systems is
growing exponentially. Similar to other wireless communication protocols,
throughput and reliability are two key performance metrics in Bluetooth Low
Energy communications. However, electromagnetic interference from various
sources can heavily affect the performance of wireless devices, leading to
dropped throughput and unreliable communication. Therefore, there is a need for
both theoretical and practical studies capable of quantifying the BLE
communication performance, e.g. throughput and reliability, subject to
interference. In this paper, a mathematical model to predict throughput of a
BLE connection under interference is derived first, and linked to the
reliability model we developed in [1]. After that, extensive practical
experiments are performed in various scenarios to sufficiently validate the
theoretical results from both models. Finally, the trade-off between throughput
and reliability is investigated through the validated models to give some
inside properties of BLE communications. The similarity between the theoretical
results and the experimental ones highlights the accuracy of the proposed
throughput and reliability models. Hence, the two models can be used to explore
the performance of various BLE designs or deployments from diverse
perspectives.
