This is more about what suits your situation the best. UHF (Ultra High Frequency) and VHF (Very High Frequency) is the length of the radio wave used by your radios. The higher the frequency, the shorter the radio wave. As a rule of thumb, the longer the radio wave, the better it bends around the curvature of the earth.

Unfortunately this is not where the argument finishes!

While UHF is more line of sight than VHF as a standard is far more widely adopted. This is for a number of reasons.

  1. PRS (unlicensed operation) is only available for UHF
  2. Most other services use UHF (NZ Track and Speedway)
  3. From a circuit perspective, easily covers all tracks in NZ that we have tested!
  4. Most other competitors are using UHF
  5. To use VHF you MUST have a RSM (Radio Spectrum Management NZ) commercial license.

While VHF technically has better coverage, our testing with enduro (longer distance) style racing is that there is very little difference. Once you try to transmit through trees, both VHF and UHF have very little coverage without the use or a “repeater”. (See what is a repeater? in this FAQ).  While we do have both UHF and VHF equipment, most competitors choose to use UHF for the above rational.