Baofeng UV-5R Two Way Radio Dual Band 144-148/420-450Mhz Walkie Talkie 1800mAh Li-ion Battery(Black)

This little radio is extremely powerful and has a great battery life (multiple days of standby power if you enable power saving mode and don't transmit) and it has a removable antenna so you can attach something like a Nagoya, Yagi, or custom coaxial antenna to it.If you buy the extended battery or even just another standard battery, you'll have more battery life than you know what to do with, unless you are constantly transmitting with VOX or you're constantly listening to FM radio with the volume turned up!The stock antenna is pretty good compared to the other more expensive Baofengs, but upgrading to a nagoya NA-771 removes a ton of the faint background hiss on both rx and tx, as well as increasing the tx range quite a bit. From my bench, I couldn't really pick up any additional FM radio stations when scanning through the entire FM range using the Nagoya vs the stock antenna, but what I did notice was that every single station came through crystal clear after swapping the antenna, whereas before it would pick them all up but some stations definitely had poor reception unless I would walk all around the garage looking for a good signal path.It has quite a few nice features but nothing digital, and doesn't have true dual watch monitoring, but with TDR turned on for me I'm able to monitor two frequencies and pick which one I care about more so if they're both active it will let me listen to the "preferred" frequency. It has dcs and ctcss codes for accessing those repeaters, and supports DTMF codes for dialing into Internet relay repeaters or echolink repeaters.As far as ease of use, you will need the manual to decipher the different options in the settings menu. There are some websites out there that give a more detailed breakdown of the menu options and their descriptions, as well as youtube videos to demonstrate more complicated things like programming or connecting two Baofengs to make a mobile repeater. Both of those capabilities require a different cable, not included.Finally, regarding programming, you DO NOT need to get the programming cable as you can do everything right from the radio. If you want to look up different frequencies of your local repeaters and store them in the memory channels, you can do that pretty quickly and easily right from the radio once you learn the flow. Where the programming cable comes in handy is when you want to add a hinge number of pre-programmed channels to the radio, but IMO there is no need for that. I tried it with all the virginia repeaters and found that only 1 or 2 ever had any traffic, even when I would go driving for hours and leave it on channel scan mode. Where I think the programming cable would come in handy is if you routinely traveled out of state (like from the east coast to the west coast) and you had a different set of frequencies and repeaters and settings for each location that you wanted to be able to swap between easily. When you go to the west coast you can just backup your east coast profile to save any changes you made or any new frequencies you saved, and then restore the west coast profile so you're able to make changes and save any new frequencies you find there. Then when you're ready to come back, just save the west coast profile to the computer and restore the east coast profile.

The Baofeng UV-5R Two Way Radio Dual Band is amazing, especially for the price! The performance is solid, and the dual-band feature makes it versatile for all kinds of communication needs. It’s easy to use, reliable, and has great battery life. I’m so impressed that I’m planning on buying another one. If you’re looking for a budget-friendly, quality two-way radio, this is a fantastic choice. Highly recommend!

Excellent little radio . Took me a second to get it working in chirp ..(just read the reviews the trick is listed by a buyer) after that it was smooth programming

Bought this for my son and he really likes it. It gets the job.

Nice little radio I guess. Honestly I only got it because it was a deal and I keep seeing them everywhere. First off it’s tiny. Why does it look bigger in pictures? That’s good and bad. It’s good for a bug out bag. It’s bad because it’s well small. The owners manual came with bends in it and for whatever reason no matter how much you try and straighten it… it stays bent. Not happy. You couldn’t take the time to put it in the box right? Guess they’re really busy over there at the factory.I have no idea what I am going to do with it as I already have a Yaesu in my bug out bag. Keep it in a vehicle maybe? Why not. I won’t go into using it, performance and all that. Plenty on YouTube.Try the fm frequencies. The speaker isn’t half bad!

These worked really well and are very fun. Just to make sure you check the distance range.

The BaoFeng UV-5R is the best radio ever made. That may sound ridiculous for a $20 handheld but stay with me for a minute.There is no other radio that offers all of the basic features you might want in a handheld at this price and honestly I would recommend the UV-5R over any other radio under $100, because any additional features you would get out of another radio in that price range won’t be enough to justify the increased cost over the UV-5R. Honestly the only real reason I can see to get a more expensive handheld is for something a bit more durable or something capable of digital modes like DMR or P25.This radio isn’t perfect but it gives you everything you need to get started with radio communication for less than I would pay to eat out for dinner once, and while it’s not the most durable, if you do break it you’re only out $20. There is a lot of value in the fact that I don’t have to worry about breaking or losing it, which is something you don’t really get from any other radio.I say it isn’t the most durable but that doesn’t mean it’s flimsy either, I was really surprised when I picked mine up for the first time and found it surprisingly heavy. The plastic the radio is made out of doesn’t feel flimsy at all either.The UV-5R isn’t perfect, the stock antenna isn’t very good, but for another $20 you can get a Nagoya 771 antenna that works great with it, and if the battery it comes with isn’t lasting long enough for you, you can get an extended 3200mah battery that will easily last you all day (they also make the radio look a lot cooler). The keypad also isn’t great, it feels fine but it’s very easy to accidentally double press a button which is a little annoying.If you have ever been so much as curious about radio communication, definitely pick one of these up and play around with it. Maybe watch some youtube videos on how to set it up though, the instructions aren’t great.