Ultra-wideband (UWB) has been identified as the future technology. Mostly, band- width critical applications such as sensor data collection and location tracking can benefit from the advantageous, highly wide bandwidth of the UWB technology. It is very challenging for the antenna engineers to reduce the size of the antenna while maintaining the performance parame- ters such as low voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR), wide bandwidth and symmetric radiation patterns. In this paper, a novel, compact printed monopole antenna has been proposed for the portable wireless communication devices. The operating frequency range of the proposed antenna spans from 3–12 GHz, covering the entire frequency range of the UWB spectrum whose range is from 3.1–10.6 GHz. The simulated results of proposed antenna shows good conformity with measured results. The antenna has been etched out in the middle of the radiating patch to form a slot. Moreover, the size of the ground plane has also been reduced. These techniques have been effective to widen the bandwidth of this compact antenna for UWB operation.