A network device (e.g., an evolved Node B (eNB), user equipment (UE) or the like) can operate to enable scheduling of transmissions within physical resource blocks (PRBs) as a non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) zone and as an orthogonal multiple access (OMA) zone to enable multiplexing UEs over a long term evolution (LTE) or next generation (NextGen) 5G based network for uplink transmissions. A first UE of the UEs can be scheduled to generate uplink transmissions from PRBs within the NOMA zone without an explicit grant message based on predefined threshold of a first transmission packet size or a first transmission rate. Another UE can also be scheduled to utilize resources of the NOMA zone or the OMA zone based on the predefined threshold.