so ive been on FT8 for a while now and yeah its great for working new entities and all that but honestly after a while it feels like youre just clicking buttons and watching a waterfall. theres no real communication happening, just signal reports and 73 and done. heard about JS8Call and that it was built on the same weak signal foundation as FT8 but lets you actually type messages back and forth. been thinking about switching over for some of my HF time but dont really know anyone running it in my area.

also curious how the timing/sequencing works compared to FT8 — i know FT8 is locked to 15 second slots and JS8Call has a few different speed modes? my radio is an IC-7300 going into WSJT-X right now with VARA and stuff already set up for winlink so i dont think the hardware side is a problem. just wondering if its worth learning another piece of software and if theres actually activity on JS8 or if its kind of a ghost town these days compared to FT8

JS8Call is definitely more of a chat thing yeah. the normal speed mode is 15 seconds per frame like FT8 but theres also slow (30s), turbo (6s), and ultra modes depending on what youre trying to do. activity is definitely less than FT8 but its not dead — 14.078 USB gets some use and theres a few nets that run it regularly. the thing i actually like about it is you can leave it running and it kind of works like a store-and-forward system, so someone can send you a message and it sits there waiting. its got a heartbeat function too so your station just kind of announces itself periodically. its a different vibe for sure, more like a slow BBS than a contact logger. if youre already set up with WSJT-X the audio routing for JS8Call should be almost identical, its built off the same codebase more or less.

i tried js8call for maybe two weeks last winter and just couldnt get into it honestly. felt like i was waiting forever for replies and half the time the other station would just disappear mid-conversation. maybe i had the wrong expectations going in. FT4 might be worth a look if you want something faster than FT8 — its like 7.5 second slots so contest-style but still weak signal capable. not really a chat mode either but at least you rack up contacts quicker. PSK31 is still around if you want actual keyboard to keyboard stuff with more of an old school feel, theres still some activity on 20m around 14.070 most evenings