Technology for a user equipment (UE), configured for coverage enhanced (CE) machine type communication (MTC) is disclosed. The UE can encode, at the UE, a UE capability message for transmission to a next generation node B (gNB) or evolved Node B (eNB), wherein the UE capability message includes a capability to support communication using a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) that includes 64 quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM). The UE can decode, at the UE, a higher layer signaling message to configure the UE to operate in a CE mode A. The UE can decode, at the UE, data received in a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) transmission to the UE that is modulated using a 64 QAM.