I'm a Tech planning to upgrade to General next month and feeling overwhelmed by all the HF frequency privileges I need to memorize. The exam is 35 questions and I keep getting confused about which bands General class operators can use fully vs. partially. Any study tips for tackling the frequency privilege questions without just memorizing everything?

Focus on the exceptions rather than trying to memorize everything. The bands Generals don't have full access to are 80, 40, 20, and 15 - memorize those specific frequency ranges. 160, 60, 30, 17, 12, and 10 meters are the bands that General class holders get all amateur frequency privileges. Much easier than trying to remember everything!

When General class licensees are not permitted to use the entire voice portion of a band, the upper frequency end is the portion generally available to them. Also remember the four key numbers: 7.25, 356, 390, 1430 - if you see these in answer choices about frequencies, that's usually correct!

Don't overthink it - the ham radio exams let you see the questions word-for-word before you take the test, and with only 35 total questions, applicants tend to overthink the exam. Every single question they can ask about bandplans and frequencies is in the question pool - it tells you exactly what you need to know.