ok so ive been licensed about 8 months now and people keep telling me i should be chasing DXCC but honestly i dont really understand the difference between all these awards. like is DXCC the one where you need 100 countries? and WAZ is zones? and WAS is all 50 states? im pretty sure thats right but every time i read about it on the ARRL site i get confused because they talk about entities vs countries and apparently those arent the same thing which threw me off completely.

im running a modest station, just a Yaesu FT-891 into a wire dipole up about 30 feet, mostly on 40 and 20m. ive already worked maybe 40 or 50 different countries just casually without even trying to log them properly which is kind of annoying in hindsight. i think some of those would have counted. do i need to go back and get QSLs for all of them or does Logbook of the World work for this stuff? sorry if this is a dumb question

not a dumb question at all, this stuff is genuinely confusing when you first get into it. you've basically got it right — DXCC is 100 entities (and yeah entity vs country trips everyone up at first, things like the Canary Islands count separately from mainland Spain, stuff like that), WAS is confirmed contacts with all 50 states, and WAZ is all 40 CQ zones. they're all separate awards with separate applications.

the good news is LoTW absolutely counts for all of them and honestly its way easier than chasing paper QSLs. the ARRL manages both DXCC and WAS through LoTW so if the other station is also on LoTW and uploads their log, boom, you've got a confirmed credit without mailing anything. not everyone uses it though so sometimes you still end up needing a card for certain rare ones.

for those past contacts — if you logged them even in a basic log it might be worth uploading to LoTW now and seeing what shakes out. some of those ops may have already uploaded and you'd get the credits automatically. definitely start logging properly going forward though, 40-50 entities in 8 months on a wire dipole is actually a solid start

yeah what he said. also dont stress too much about having a perfect station for this, i worked my first 100 entities on a G5RV in a townhouse backyard so your setup is totally fine. 20m is your friend for DX, especially in the mornings and evenings depending on where youre located.

one thing i'd add — WAS can sometimes be trickier than it sounds because getting all 50 confirmed takes a while, some of the less populated states just dont have as many operators active and you end up waiting for a good opening to somewhere like Delaware or North Dakota. DXCC kinda snowballs once you get going though, once you hit 100 you'll find yourself wanting 150, then 200... its a rabbit hole fair warning