OpenRIS: Democratizing reconfigurable intelligent surfaces for real-world wireless enhancements

Wireless enhancement is critical for next-generation mobile communication systems to realize seamless connectivity, yet traditional network expansion strategies are becoming economically unsustainable. Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) provide a promising alternative by improving signal utilization. However, high hardware and deployment costs of advanced RISs limit their large-scale application. Here, we democratize this technology with OpenRIS, an open-source and low-cost platform composed of Lego-like meta-bricks. With digital-twin assistance, these meta-bricks can be flexibly assembled into arbitrary shapes to achieve customized, mass-deployable wireless enhancement without extra power. Experiments and full-wave simulations verify that the discretized OpenRIS achieves consistent performance with the continuous RIS. We further develop a dual-user wireless transmission system and a three-dimensional coverage measurement system to showcase the versatile applicability of OpenRIS in wireless enhancements. As a plug-and-play solution, OpenRIS accelerates the translation of RIS theory into practice and is poised to integrate into infrastructure, reshaping the future wireless world as steel and concrete shape modern cities.