ok so ive been licensed about 8 months now and i keep hearing different things about confirming contacts and i'm honestly a bit lost. when i first got on HF my elmer told me to sign up for LoTW which i did and i upload my logs there pretty regularly. but then someone i worked on 40m last week said they only use eQSL and dont bother with LoTW at all, and then another guy sent me an actual paper card through the bureau which was really cool but i have no idea how to send one back properly.

so like what's the actual difference between all these systems? i understand LoTW is run by the ARRL and is more official or whatever but does that mean eQSL confirmations dont count for anything? and the paper cards through the bureau — do i need to join something or pay for that? i set up an account on QRZ but i'm not sure if that connects to anything.

sorry if this is a really basic question, i just want to make sure im not missing contacts that could count toward awards or whatever down the line. been chasing a few DX stations and would hate to lose those confirmations

totally normal to be confused by this, it took me a while to sort it all out too. so the short version is that LoTW is basically the gold standard if you're going for ARRL awards like DXCC — those confirmations have to be LoTW or a physical card, eQSL doesn't count for DXCC credit. that said eQSL is still used by a ton of people especially in Europe and it has its own award system that some folks really enjoy.

for the bureau — yeah you'll want to check if your national society handles incoming QSLs. in the US the ARRL runs the incoming bureau for most calls and it's included with membership i think, outgoing you pay by the pound basically. it can take forever though, sometimes a year or more for cards to come through. i've got a stack sitting somewhere from 2021 i still haven't fully sorted through lol.

honestly just keep doing what you're doing with LoTW and maybe sign up for eQSL too since it's free and some stations only use that. and when someone sends you a paper card just send one back the same way, you can order basic cards pretty cheap from a few printers, VistaPrint or one of the ham-specific ones like KB0TT's place or similar. don't stress too much about it

yeah what he said. i'll add that QRZ logbook is a separate thing again — you can sync it with LoTW in some logging programs but its confirmations dont count for ARRL awards either. i use all three honestly just because why not, more chances someone confirms the contact.

the DX stations you're chasing, a lot of the big ones upload to LoTW eventually but sometimes it takes months after a dxpedition for them to get everything processed so don't panic if you dont see a confirmation right away. just keep uploading your own logs consistently and it'll sort itself out