ok so ive been licensed about 8 months now and i keep seeing people talk about LoTW and eQSL and paper QSL cards and im honestly a little overwhelmed by the whole thing. like do i need to be doing all of these or is one enough? i set up a LoTW account a while back but i still havent figured out how to actually upload my log to it, the certificate stuff was confusing to me.

and then people in my club keep talking about QSL cards and how its a tradition and all that which i get, but it also seems expensive if youre working a lot of contacts. i made about 300 QSOs in my first few months and i cant imagine sending paper cards to all of them. do most people just do the digital stuff now and only send paper cards for special ones? or is there an etiquette thing where if someone sends you a card you have to send one back no matter what

sorry if this is a dumb question, just trying to figure out what everyone actually does in practice vs what youre technically supposed to do

not a dumb question at all, this stuff genuinely is confusing when youre starting out. so the short answer is no, you dont need all three, but each one has its own purpose depending on what youre going for.

LoTW is basically the gold standard if you want to work toward ARRL awards like DXCC or WAS because it only counts confirmations from there for those awards. eQSL is more casual and some people swear by it but it isnt accepted for most of the big awards. paper cards are kind of the sentimental tradition of the hobby and yeah if someone sends you one its considered polite to send one back, but nobody is going to track you down if you dont.

for uploading to LoTW — what logging software are you using? most of the popular ones like Log4OM or WSJT-X have pretty straightforward LoTW upload built right in once you get your certificate sorted. the certificate process through TQSL is a bit of a pain the first time but once its done its done. if you want i can walk you through it, just let me know what software youre on.

yeah i was in the same boat when i first got licensed lol. what i ended up doing was just using LoTW for everything serious and then i joined eQSL too because its free and why not. i probably get like 2-3 paper cards a month in the mail and i keep a stack of my own cards to send back when that happens. got mine printed through one of those online places for like 20 bucks for 200 cards which honestly isnt that bad.

the thing that surprised me is how many older ops still really care about the physical cards. had a guy from Japan send me this beautifully printed card after a 40m contact and it felt kinda wrong not to have something nice to send back. so i guess my advice is just get a small batch of paper cards made at some point, doesnt have to be anything fancy, and then use LoTW for your actual award chasing