so i decided to finally go for my technician license after hanging around a local club for a few months and everyone says just memorize the question pool but honestly im not sure thats the best way to go about it? like i bought the ARRL handbook but its way more than i need right now and i feel like im drowning in info about stuff that wont even be on the test

is there a specific study guide people actually recommend or is the free stuff online good enough. i found hamstudry.org i think it was called and did a few practice tests but my scores are all over the place, like 70% one time then 55% the next which is kind of discouraging. the actual exam is 35 questions right and you need like 26 to pass? someone at the club told me the electrical theory part trips up most new people and honestly yeah that ohms law stuff with the formulas is where im losing points i think

anyway just wondering how others approached it and roughly how long it took before feeling ready to actually sit for the exam

honestly the ARRL handbook is overkill for tech, dont even worry about that thing right now. what worked for me was just hammering the question pool on hamstudy.org every day for like 2-3 weeks, maybe 20-30 minutes a session. the site tracks which questions you keep getting wrong and focuses on those which is pretty useful. dont try to understand every single concept perfectly before the exam, some of the theory stuff like the electrical formulas you can learn better after you pass and actually start using the radio

the 70% to 55% swings are totally normal early on, you havent seen all the questions yet so you'll hit topics you havent reviewed. just keep going and once you're consistently hitting 80+ on the practice tests you're probably good. the real exam felt easier to me than the practice ones weirdly enough, maybe just because i wasnt overthinking it

yeah 26 out of 35 is passing, you got that right. the Gordon West study guide is what a lot of people around here recommend over the ARRL one for the tech exam, its written more conversationally and doesnt assume you know anything coming in. theres also a guy on youtube, i cant remember his name right now, who does videos going through the whole question pool section by section and explains the why behind the answers which helped me actually retain stuff instead of just memorizing

the ohms law questions arent as bad as they look once you realize theres basically only a handful of different versions they ask and if you know the triangle trick you can get through all of them. someone at your club can probably show you that in about 5 minutes