so ive been a Tech for about 8 months now and mostly just been doing 2m and 70cm stuff, some APRS and a little DMR. been thinking about going for General so i can actually get on HF but i honestly dont know where to start with studying. like i know theres the question pool and all that but is it actually as hard as people say or am i overthinking it. some of the electrical theory stuff from the Tech exam already had me sweating and i hear General has more of that. also does it matter which bands i focus on first once i pass, someone at my club mentioned 40m is good for beginners but wasnt sure why

honestly it's not that bad if you already passed Tech, a lot of the concepts overlap and you kind of already have the foundation. the extra electrical theory is a step up but nothing crazy, mostly stuff like reactance and impedance and some antenna math. i used the HamStudy website and just drilled questions every night for like 3 weeks and felt pretty comfortable by the time i sat for it. the thing people get tripped up on is the regulations stuff because there's more of it on General, like privileges on each band and things like third party traffic rules. just read through the ARRL General study guide or even Gordon West's book once and then hammer the practice tests.

and yeah 40m is a solid starting point, especially in the evenings when propagation usually picks up for domestic contacts. 20m is great too once you get comfortable, lots of activity during the day. good luck, you'll probably surprise yourself

i was in the same spot like a year ago, went for General about 6 months after getting my Tech ticket. the exam felt harder than Tech to me mostly because i rushed the studying but i still passed first try so. the electrical theory questions looked scarier than they were, a lot of them you can just memorize the answer without actually understanding the formula if thats what it takes lol. dont sleep on the operating procedures section either, i almost missed a couple there becuase i assumed i knew it already