Wake-up receivers (WuRxs) can improve the lifetime of a wireless sensor network by reducing energy consumption from undesirable idle listening. The amplitude level of the incoming RF signal is used by a WuRx to generate an interrupt and wake up the radio of a sleeping sensor node. Existing passive WuRx designs are generally based on RFID tags that incur high cost and complexity. Thus, there is a need for cost-effective and low-complexity WuRxs suited for both long-range and directed wake-ups. In this work, we present a WuRx design using an RF energy harvesting circuit (RFHC). Experimental results show that our RFHC-based WuRx can provide a wake-up range sensitivity around 4 cm/mW at low transmit RF powers (< 20 mff), which scales to a long wake-up range at high powers. Our design also obtains accurate selective wake-ups. We finally present simulation-based studies for optimizing the design of RFHCs that enhance decoding efficiency with improved rise and fall times. © 2015 IEEE.