so ive been a Tech for about 8 months now and honestly been mostly just doing 2m/70cm stuff with my HT and a little bit of packet radio stuff on the side. but lately ive been really wanting to get on HF, i tried listening on 40m with just a wire antenna i threw up and man theres just so much going on down there, i want to actually transmit not just listen

anyway my question is how hard is the General exam compared to Tech. i remember the Tech test wasnt too bad, i used the HamStudy website and just drilled questions for like 3 weeks. is it the same kind of deal for General or is there like actual math i need to know. someone at my club mentioned something about the electrical principles section being tricky and now im a little worried. also wondering if its worth going straight for Extra but that seems like a big jump

any advice appreciated, trying to figure out how much time i need to set aside for this

honestly the General isnt that much harder than Tech if you use the same study method. the question pool is a bit bigger and yeah there are some formulas involved like ohms law stuff and a little bit about feedline impedance matching but nothing that'll make your head explode. i just used HamStudy same as Tech and passed with like 2 weeks of studying maybe 20-30 mins a day. the electrical stuff you kind of pick up as you go through the questions, you dont really need to sit down and learn full theory, just understand why the answer is what it is

as for going straight to Extra, i wouldnt bother unless you really want those last few kHz on each band or you just want the challenge. Extra is noticeably harder and theres a lot more RF propagation and circuit theory. get your General first, get on HF, have some fun, then maybe revisit it after a year or so when you actually understand what they're asking about

just passed my General like 6 weeks ago, same situation as you basically. the math on the test is not as bad as people make it sound, most of it you can just memorize the answer to without actually understanding how to do the calculation and you'll still pass fine. the part i actually found tricky was some of the operating procedures and band plan questions, stuff about which modes are allowed where on HF, that kind of thing. definitely go through those carefully

40m is great btw once you get on there, especially in the evenings, you can work some pretty decent distances even with a simple wire