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H. F. Amateur Bands

A brief outline of the short wave (HF) amateur radio bands is shown below. These may have been change since I wrote this and allocations may differ slightly between global regions. The colours for daytime propagation (lower) and night time propagation (upper) have the same meanings as on my propagation diagram.


160 Metre Band (also called 'Top Band'): 1810-1850 kHz (40 kHz wide). Normally local, but long distance possible during autumn & winter nights.
80 Metre Band: 3500-3800 kHz (300 kHz wide). Local during day, long distance at night all year round.
40 Metre Band: 7000-7100 kHz (100 kHz wide). World-wide at night. <1000 miles during day.
7.000 to 7.045 MHz allocated to CW
7.045 to 7.100 MHz allocated to LSB
30 Metre Band: 10100-10150 kHz (only 50 kHz wide). A 'transitional' band, ie it straddles the boundary between the 'night time only' and '24-hour'.
20 Metre Band: 14000-14350 kHz (350 kHz wide). World-wide day/early evening. 24-hour during solar peaks.
14.0000 to 14.0700 CW
14.0700 to 14.1000 USB
14.10 to 14.1120 CW
14.1120 to 14. USB
17 Metre Band: 18068-18168 kHz (100 kHz wide). World-wide, less crowded than other bands.
15 Metre Band: 21000-21450 kHz (450 kHz wide). Out-performs 20 metre band during solar peaks.
12 Metre Band: 24890-24990 kHz (100 kHz wide). Allocated in 1979. Daytime during solar peaks.

The 10 Metre Band: 28000-29700 kHz (1700 kHz wide - bigger than the Medium Wave broadcast band). Normally a local band, but biggest and best world-wide daytime band during solar peaks.

Different parts of each amateur band are often allocated to different kinds of amateur radio transmissions. For example, one part of a band may be reserved for ordinary amplitude modulation (AM) voice transmissions, another for single side band (SSB) voice transmissions, another for Morse code transmissions and another for frequency-shift keying [radio teletype (RTTY) or data] transmissions. Certain parts of a band may be used for two or more types of transmission. Some amateur bands - or parts thereof - are shared with other kinds of users. For full details check out this web site for nice presentation or this one for the original ITU Document.

Start of book. This page's parent. About this book. About its author. ©Apr 1994 Robert J Morton