so ive been a tech for about 8 months now and mostly been doing 2m and 70cm stuff, some APRS, got into a few nets. but honestly i keep hearing people talk about HF and working dx and all that and it sounds way more interesting than what im doing now. figured maybe its time to look at the general upgrade.

my question is kind of all over the place sorry. like how hard is the general exam compared to technician? i remember the tech exam feeling pretty manageable but i hear the general has a lot more about propagation and like band plans and electrical stuff? also once i pass do i immediately get HF privileges or is there a waiting period or something i have to do first. and what bands am i even going to get as a general, is it most of them or just certain segments. sorry for the dumb questions just trying to figure out if its worth putting the time in before i go buy a radio for it

General isnt bad at all honestly. the pool has more questions and some of the electrical theory goes a little deeper than tech but nothing that should scare you off. i used HamStudy dot org and just drilled the question pool for maybe 3 weeks on and off, passed first try with like an 88 or something. the propagation stuff is actually pretty interesting once you get into it because you start to understand why 40m sounds completely different at night vs during the day and it stops being magic.

as far as privileges go, once you pass the exam the VEs submit your paperwork to the FCC and it usually shows up in the ULS database within a day or two, sometimes same day. once its in there youre legal to operate, you dont have to wait for a physical license or anything like that. General opens up a big chunk of the HF bands, like you get most of 40m, good portions of 20m and 15m and 10m, its enough to keep you busy for a long time. 20m especially is where a lot of the action is during decent propagation. honestly just go for it, the hardest part is deciding to study

yeah i was in the same spot like a year ago, tech for almost a year and felt like i was kind of stuck. passed general last spring and picked up a used Icom 7300 a few months later and its been a completely different hobby basically. 40m at night is wild, you can just spin the dial and hear stations from all over. the exam itself i thought was slightly harder than tech but not by a ton, the math questions tripped me up a little but theres only a few of them and you can kind of learn which formulas to memorize. worth it for sure