Verification of AMBA APB Bus Protocol Using UVM
S Saravanan, Devika K G, T S Dheena, P Divyasri · 2025
The architectures should be interconnected and managed with functional blocks. Ensuring the correct implementation and functionality of the AMBA protocol is crucial for the reliability and performance of SoC devices. This paper presents a verification methodology for the AMBA APB bus protocol using (UVM). Our verification approach involves developing a UVM based testbench that models the AMBA APB bus protocol and generates directed and constrained-random transactions to exercise the design under test (DUT). System Verilog has various components through which the transaction is driven to DUT and capture the outputs. The drivers that initiate transactions, monitors observe bus activity and scoreboards check protocol compliance and data integrity. We implemented a comprehensive set of tests that cover various scenarios, including read and write transactions, single transfers, different data sizes, and error conditions. The UVM testbench is highly configurable, allowing users to customize test scenarios, transaction parameters, and coverage goals. The verification environment successfully detected protocol violations and corner-case bugs that would have been challenging to find using traditional directed testing approaches. This work highlights the benefits of adopting the SV testbench for verifying bus protocols like AMBA. This enables the creation of robust, flexible, and reusable verification environments that can thoroughly exercise and validate SoC designs, improving their quality and reliability.