DS0, or Digital Signal Zero, is a standard digital transmission rate for digital telecommunications.

What is DS0?

DS0 stands for Digital Signal Zero, and it is a standard digital transmission rate for digital telecommunications. DS0 defines a transmission rate of 64 Kbps and can carry either a single voice channel or data.

Telecommunication carriers transmit digital signals in multiples of DS0 called DS1, DS2, and so on. These multiples differ depending on whether you are dealing with the T-carrier system of North America or the E-carrier system of Europe and other continents.

The following table lists the common DS-series transmission rates and their T-series or E-series equivalents (when defined). For example, you can see that a T1 data transmission is equivalent to 24 DS0 transmissions multiplexed together and can transmit data at a rate of 1.544 Mbps.

DS-Series Transmission Rates

DS Type	Multiple of DS0	Data Rate	T-Series	E-Series
DS0	1	64 Kbps	N/A	N/A
DS1	24	1.544 Mbps	T1	N/A
N/A	32	2.048 Mbps	N/A	E1
DS1C	48	3.152 Mbps	N/A	N/A
DS2	96	6.312 Mbps	T2	N/A
N/A	128	8.448 Mbps	N/A	E2
N/A	512	34.368 Mbps	N/A	E3
DS3	672	44.736 Mbps	T3	N/A
N/A	2048	139.264 Mbps	N/A	E4
DS4	4032	274.176 Mbps	N/A	N/A
N/A	8192	565.148 Mbps	N/A	E5