ok so ive been licensed for about 3 months now and i upgraded to general last month. i know i have more privileges now but honestly looking at the band plan chart is kinda confusing me more than it helps. like for 40 meters specifically i see different sections listed but i cant tell if those are hard limits or just like... suggestions? my elmer told me the ARRL band plan is different from the actual FCC allocations and now im even more lost. is there like a simple way to think about this because i dont want to key up somewhere im not supposed to be

yeah this trips up a lot of new generals, dont feel bad. so the key thing is there are two separate things going on. the FCC part 97 rules are the law -- those are the hard limits you absolutely cannot cross. for 40m as a general you get phone privileges from 7.175 up to 7.300 MHz, below that down to 7.025 is CW and digital for generals too. the ARRL band plan is more of a gentlemans agreement, it tells you where SSB activity tends to cluster versus where CW ops hang out, but nobody is going to cite you for being in the wrong spot within your legal privileges. the band edge thing though, stay away from exactly 7.300 because your signal has sidebands and if any of that bleeds over youre technically out of band. most people stay at least 3 kHz inside the edge to be safe, so like 7.297 or so for the upper end on phone.

just to add what the other guy said -- i was in the same boat when i upgraded and what finally clicked for me was remembering that on SSB your displayed frequency on the radio is the carrier, not where your actual audio is. so on USB if youre sitting on 7.299 your voice is going up to maybe 7.302 and youre now illegal. most people i know just sort of stay below 7.295 to give themselves some breathing room and not stress about it