Today’s access networks are in high demand to fulfill the high bandwidth requirement because of extensive improvement in high transmission rate applications for cloud computing, big data analytics, and other next-generation 5G smart applications. This exponential growth of high capacity and broadband access technologies comprise an essential trend in the development of a passive optical network (PON) access network. In this paper, 80/80 Gbps time wavelength division multiplexing PON (TWDM-PON) incorporating polarization division multiplexing (PDM) based Mach–Zehnder modulator (MZM) and electroabsorption modulator (EAM) techniques have been proposed. The performance of the system consisting of different polarized multiplexed modulation techniques is investigated in both downstream and upstream data transmission for variable transmission distance and received optical power in terms of bit error rate (BER), eye diagrams, power budget (PB) and receiver sensitivity. The results show that the 4 × 20/20 Gbps PDM-EAM modulated signals over 100 km fiber distance at − 60 dBm RS and 70 dB PB are successfully transmitted under fiber non-linearities. The proposed TWDM-PON system provides a next-generation long-reach access network from urban to rural areas.