so I've been interested in ham radio for a while now mostly because my neighbor does it and it seems pretty cool. I finally decided to just go for it and get my technician license but honestly the whole thing is kind of overwhelming. I looked up the question pool online and there's like 400 something questions and I dont even know what half the words mean. is there a good way to study for this or do I just memorize everything? someone at work said theres apps for it but I dont know which ones are actually worth using. also how hard is the actual exam, like should I be worried about it

honestly dont overthink it, the tech exam really isnt that bad once you get into it. the question pool is public and the actual test questions come straight from it so theres no surprises. I used HamStudy dot org when I was studying and it was really good, it kind of tracks which questions youre getting wrong and drills you on those more. took me maybe 3 weeks of studying a little bit each night and I passed no problem. the hardest part for most people is probably the electrical theory stuff like ohms law and some of the antenna questions but even that stuff clicks after a bit. dont bother trying to understand every single concept deeply right away, just get familiar enough to recognize the right answer and youll be fine for the test, you can learn the deeper stuff after you get on the air

yeah HamStudy is what most people recommend these days. there's also the ARRL Technician manual if you want an actual book to read through, I liked having something physical to go through but plenty of people just do the online practice exams and pass fine. one thing I'd say is pay attention to the questions about operating privileges and frequencies because there's a bunch of those and they can trip you up if you're not careful. also the safety stuff like RF exposure and tower grounding shows up more than you'd think. find a local club too if you can, a lot of them do licensing sessions and sometimes they'll even hold a study session before the exam which helps a lot