Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communication are described. A user equipment (UE) operating in unlicensed spectrum may determine that a base station is not transmitting during a particular time period (e.g., by detecting the absence of a control signal). The UE may then perform a listen-before-talk (LBT) procedure and, if the channel is available, may perform an autonomous uplink (UL) transmission. The autonomous UL transmission may include control information to facilitate decoding. Thus, the base station may receive the control information, and decode the rest of the autonomous UL transmission accordingly. The base station may configure the UE for autonomous UL transmissions when the radio link is established, and may also send dynamic configuration information to initiate, suspend, or reconfigure parameters for autonomous UL transmissions.