Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communication are described. A user equipment (UE) and a base station may establish narrowband communications. The base station may configure positioning reference signal (PRS) resources based at least in part on wideband or narrowband transmissions, and a UE may receive the PRS transmissions over one or more narrowband regions. The UE, may determine PRS resources and receive portions of wideband PRS transmissions that are transmitted in one or more narrowband regions of the system bandwidth. The base station may configure PRS resources separately for narrowband devices, such as according to a bandwidth of the narrowband devices or with a single PRS tone per symbol compared to two PRS tones per symbol that may be used for wideband PRS transmissions. The base station may perform positioning measurements for a UE based at least in part on timing of uplink transmissions from the UE.