Technical Conference: 15 - 19 March 2026
Exhibition: 17 - 19 March 2026
Los Angeles Convention Center | Los Angeles, California, USA

Technical Conference: 15 - 19 March 2026
Exhibition: 17 - 19 March 2026
Los Angeles Convention Center | Los Angeles, California, USA

Conference Programs

Attendees

The Technical Conference Program

OFC’s five-day, technical conference features peer-reviewed presentations and more than 120 invited speakers, representing thought leaders across the industry. Additional technical programming throughout the week includes symposia, short courses, demo zone and special events.

Symposia

Comprised of invited and contributed papers, on areas deemed to be of special interest to OFC conference attendees.

Short Courses

Short Courses cover a broad range of topic areas at a variety of educational levels, and are taught by highly-regarded industry experts on a number of subjects. Whether you choose a course designed for beginners or for more advanced instruction, the small size of each class gives you an excellent opportunity for personalized instruction. Registrants receive a copy of the course notes, which will be distributed onsite. There is a small additional fee to register for a short course.

Demo Zone

Featuring live demonstrations of research projects and proof-of-concept implementations in the space of optical communications devices, systems and networks. Demonstrations occur in dedicated booths in the Demo Zone as part of the OFC technical program.

Special Events

Make the most of your attendance at OFC with a range of networking and educational events. Special events range from receptions to career development programs.

Conference Programs & Special Events

Special Event

8:00 AM
01 April 2024

Location TBA

Plenary Session

Esteemed industry luminaries from Coherent, Nvidia and TESAT will headline the event. These distinguished speakers will explore cutting-edge technologies and provide invaluable insights into the evolving landscape of optical networking and communications.

...

Special Event

7:00 PM
16 March 2026

33 Taps, 1240 S Figueroa St, Los Angeles, CA 90015

Student Party

The OFC Student Party is an opportunity for students to meet and network in a fun and relaxed environment. Join us for a night of engaging conversations and delicious food!

Please be sure to bring a form of ID with you to the event. Sign up when registering for the...

Special Event

6:00 PM
17 March 2026

Location TBA

Conference Reception

Full Conference Registration Required
Enjoy a lively evening with drinks, hors d’oeuvres, and great conversation as we come together to launch an exciting week of learning, collaboration, and innovation.

Special Program

7:30 PM
17 March 2026

Room TBD

Rump Session: From Short Hops to Long Hauls: What Parts of the Fiber Spectrum Shall we Use, and Why?

Fiber optics communications became practical when we found, for the first time, a match between the characteristics of the medium, the transmitters, and the receivers that we were able to build with repeatable characteristics. 

Over the decades, we have developed several...

Special Event

5:00 AM
18 March 2026

Location TBA

OFC Fun Run

RSVP Required

Join us for the Annual OFC Fun Run!

We’re excited to bring the tradition of the OFC Fun Run to a brand-new city this year. Whether you’re a seasoned runner or...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Artificial Intelligence in Optical Network Control and Management

Optical networks are under pressure from soaring traffic, disaggregation, and the demand for automation, yet manual management remains brittle in the face of complex telemetry and rising cyber-risks. AI offers a path forward: from auto-provisioning and predictive maintenance to real-time resource...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: High-Speed Optical Modulators for Intra-Data Center Links: Unlocking 400 Gb/s and Beyond per

The bandwidth of the latest switch ASIC has reached at 200 Gb/s per lane. The next target of 400 Gb/s per lane is anticipated to be deployed in the industries around 2028. So far, several optical device candidates have been reported to achieve 400 Gb/s per lane and beyond, and their practical...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: How Do We Model Novel Fiber Designs Such as SDM Fibers, Hollow-Core Fibers and Other New Fibe

Advancements in multicore and hollow-core fiber technologies require sophisticated numerical modeling and simulation techniques, ranging from geometrical analysis and multiphysics simulations to the creation of digital twins for optical networks. In recent years, the modeling...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Is the Ecosystem Ready for Multicore Fibers?

The exponential rise in global data traffic from cloud computing, IoT, AI, and 5G is straining single‑core optical fiber networks to their physical and economic limits. Multicore fiber (MCF) technology offers a viable path to boost capacity, efficiency, and scalability in the telecom ecosystem...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Machine Learning is Taking Over Optical Communications—But Which Algorithms Should We Use?

This panel addresses the critical need for an effective selection framework for machine learning (ML) algorithms in optical communication networks. ML shows great potential in challenging tasks such as nonlinearity compensation, network performance monitoring, and fault management. The plethora...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Optical Sensing as a Service on Transceiver and Fiber Systems: Catering to More than just Tel

Joint optical sensing and communication technologies have received extensive attention due to fiber utilization maximization and cost-effectiveness enhancement. However, several challenges remain in realizing Optical Sensing as a Service (OSaaS), including the translation of technologies into...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Probabilistic Amplitude Shaping after 10 Years: Where Are we Now, and What is to Come?

Since its introduction a decade ago, probabilistic amplitude shaping (PAS) has evolved from a topic of academic interest to a mainstream, near ubiquitous technology adopted across a wide range of optical systems — from traditional long-haul deployments to compact pluggable transceivers....

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Satellite Optical Networks: Avoiding Vendor Lock-in Through Interoperability

Given the dynamic nature of satellite constellations, the topology of the optical network amongst the satellites will be changing as often as every few minutes. This operational reality, in turn, means that at any given moment a vendor's terminal on one satellite may have to connect to a...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: Scaling Networks for the AI Era: From Data Centers to Wide Area Networks

The explosive growth of GPU-centric AI, especially training large language models (LLMs), is driving massive bandwidth demands within data centers (DCs), across DC interconnects (DCIs), and over wide area networks. As LLM training expands beyond single sites, distributed training will further...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Panel: The Return of TWDM-PON!

The 10G TWDM-PON standardized in 2014 as G.989 has largely underperformed in the marketplace. There are various reasons why this came to pass, such as that the market didn't need the upgrade at that moment, and that single channel 50G systems became technically practical. Currently, there are...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Special Session: Rethinking Networking Convergence from operational perspective: Towards a Data and

The telecommunications industry stands at a critical crossroads. Despite years of effort and investment, telcos continue to struggle with transitioning to a truly cloud-native, data-centric operational model. Initiatives such as CORD, ETSI NFV, vRAN, virtual BNG/OLT, and cloud-native Mobile core...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Symposia: Next Generation Interconnects for AI Scale Up Systems

Current AI scale-up architectures rely heavily on high-speed PAM4-class SerDes and copper-based interconnects. As scale-up network needs grow in domain size and extend beyond a single rack, new challenges emerge—key among them are the need for high-bandwidth, low-latency connectivity often...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Symposia: Beyond the Atmosphere: Architectures and Technologies for Space-based Optical Networks

As satellite networks evolve to meet the demands of global connectivity, scientific investigation, and secure communications, optical technologies are emerging as key enablers of high-capacity, low-latency links across multiple orbits. This symposium will explore the architectures and innovations...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: Chasing the Limit: On the Path to Photonic Scale-Up with Ultra-Low-Energy/Bit

The unprecedented growth of AI models’ size and complexity made interconnecting XPUs a de facto standard for improving accelerator performance and unlocking a shared pool of memory and compute resources, putting immense pressure on the backend – also known as the scale-up &ndash...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: Do We Need to Rethink the Role of Networks in the Quantum Era?

Quantum technologies are poised to revolutionize computing, sensing, and security — but unlocking their full potential hinges on a fundamental rethinking of networking itself. As quantum...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: How Far is Too Far? Interconnect Latency and Distributed AI Training

Artificial intelligence? Generalized intelligence? Superintelligence? Delivering on this promise requires ever larger models, enormous training datasets, and millions of GPUs. Distributed training enables workloads to be spread over large geographic regions, separated by hundreds or even...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: How to Make More Money Out of Optics for Fixed and Wireless Access Networks?

Optical technologies are a key enabler but also a main contributor to the cost and complexity of telecommunications infrastructure, both for fixed and mobile access networks. This workshop aims to explore the commercial potential of optical connectivity solutions in the rapidly evolving landscape...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: MCFs at the Edge of AI: Can They Transform Intra-DC and Campus Connectivity?

Multi-core fiber (MCF) is a promising solution to address the capacity limits in current optical networks. While MCF technologies are already gaining traction in submarine systems, their commercial viability for high-density terrestrial networks still must be proven. This workshop will focus...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: Optical Networking for AI Datacenters: Technology Enablers and Key Applications

The exponential growth in AI computing demand is pushing the limits of traditional networking architectures. While per-GPU computational power continues to advance, physical and thermal constraints increasingly challenge the scalability, reliability, cost, and efficiency of current...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: The Intelligent Operator: AI’s Role in the Optical Network

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is poised to rapidly transform the telecommunications sector. This workshop will explore the added value and challenges of AI for telecom operators across key domains and across the lifecycle of the network. Examples of use cases to be discussed include AI-assisted...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: Toward Holistic Network and Environment Visibility: Are Fiber Sensing and Tomography Ready

As the demand for resilient, intelligent, and perceptual optical infrastructure continues to grow, fiber sensing and in-service network tomography are emerging as a promising path toward achieving comprehensive visibility—not only of the fiber network itself, but also of the physical...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: What Will Shape the Future of Optical Computing? Integrated vs. Bulk Optics, Analog vs. Di

Optical computing has resurged with a promise of enhancing the performance of conventional electronic systems in terms of energy efficiency, low latency and computation throughput by offering low-loss transmission, wide bandwidth, and various multiplexing schemes for parallel computation. We...

Special Program

Time TBA

Location TBA

Workshop: Will Coherent Pluggables Take Over Everything?

Initially proposed for datacenter interconnect applications, coherent pluggable modules are increasingly finding use throughout the network, as network operators seek to leverage them to save cost and power. In the set of emerging 1.6 Tb/s standards, we see coherent pluggable standards defined...