so i just passed my technician exam last week (finally) and im trying to figure out what handheld to get as my first radio. everyone i talk to says something different and i've been going down rabbit holes on youtube for like three days now and i'm more confused than when i started.

right now i'm between the Baofeng UV-5R just because its cheap and everywhere, but a few guys at the club meeting said to stay away from it and get something like a Yaesu FT-60 or maybe a Wouxun. my budget is probably around $100-150 but i could stretch if something is really worth it. mainly just want to do local repeaters and maybe some APRS eventually down the road.

does it matter that much which one i get starting out? i feel like i'll just use it to check into nets and learn the ropes for now. any thoughts appreciated, im a little lost

congrats on passing the tech exam, welcome to the hobby. so the baofeng thing is kind of a whole debate that never really ends on these forums lol. short version: they work, the receive isnt great, the transmit can be a little spurious but for a first radio on local repeaters its honestly fine. plenty of people use them for years without issues.

that said if you can swing $150-ish the Yaesu FT-65 is a much better radio than the UV-5R for not that much more money. cleaner audio, better build, actually has decent filtering so you wont hear as much garbage on busy frequencies. the FT-60 is a little older but still rock solid, you can find them used for reasonable money. Wouxuns are also good, the KG-UV9D Plus gets decent reviews if you want more bands to play with later.

for just checking into local nets and learning the ropes any of those will do the job. i'd lean toward the FT-65 personally if its in your budget, you wont feel like you immediately need to upgrade it the way some people do with the baofengs after a few months.

I was in the exact same spot about two years ago and I just went with the UV-5R because I didnt want to spend a lot on something I might not stick with. Honestly no regrets for getting started, hit all the local repeaters just fine, programmed it with CHIRP which made it way less painful than trying to do it from the keypad.

Eventually got a used FT-60 and yeah the difference in audio quality is pretty noticeable but the baofeng did its job while I was figuring everything out. If APRS is a goal look into the Kenwood TH-D74 but thats a whole different price range, like way out of the $150 bracket. For now just get something and get on the air, thats the main thing.