Methods and apparatus are provided contention based uplink data transmission. In one novel aspect, the contention-based uplink data channel is used to transmit the data directly to the network. In one embodiment, the UE selects an UL data channel from a set of preconfigured uplink contention based data channels and sends the UL data transmission on the selected UL data channel. In one embodiment, the contention based UL data has a narrow bandwidth with a long CP such that the TA is not needed from the base station. In another embodiment, a small signaling payload is included in the CB UL data transmission if the size of the data contents cannot be fit in the UL data channel. In one embodiment, the signaling payload is the BSR. The UE, subsequently, receives an UL grant and sends the remaining data contents using the allocated data channel in the UL grant.