Part 97 in Plain English

Key Points

Part 97 is the FCC’s rulebook for amateur radio, in six subparts. Click a section number for the exact wording.
Give your call sign at the end of each contact and at least every 10 minutes (§97.119).
No business traffic, music, broadcasting or codes meant to hide meaning (§97.113).
Use the least power needed; 1,500 W PEP is the most, with lower limits in some places (§97.313).
A license normally lasts 10 years, with a two-year grace period to renew, but not transmit, after it expires (§97.25, §97.21).

Part 97 is short as rulebooks go. These summaries tell you what each section is about; for the exact wording, click the section number. For what your license lets you do on the air, try the License Privileges Checker; for renewing and call signs, see Your License.

Subpart A
Subpart B
Subpart C
Subpart D
Subpart E
Subpart F

Subpart A: General Provisions

Who needs a license, the license classes, call signs, and keeping your license in order.

§97.1 Why the service exists: Emergency communications, advancing the radio art, technical skill, a pool of trained operators, and international goodwill.
§97.3 Definitions: The meaning of every term used in the rules: control operator, PEP, phone, data, repeater, and many more.
§97.5 Station license required: A station may only transmit under a license shown in the FCC database (or a visitor’s reciprocal authority). Individual, club and military recreation licenses. A club needs at least four members and a trustee.
§97.7 Control operator required: Whenever a station transmits, a licensed control operator must be responsible for it.
§97.9 Operator license classes: Novice, Technician, General, Advanced and Amateur Extra. After passing an upgrade exam you may use the new privileges for up to 365 days while the FCC processes it.
§97.11 Ships and aircraft: Needs the captain’s or pilot’s approval, and must not interfere with the craft’s own radios.
§97.13 Station location and RF exposure: Protect FCC monitoring stations within a mile, and check that your station doesn’t expose people to too much radio-frequency energy.
§97.15 Antenna structures: Towers over 200 feet or near airports go through the FAA and FCC. Local rules must reasonably accommodate ham antennas (the PRB-1 policy). 2200 m and 630 m antennas: 60 meters high at most.
§97.17 New licenses: Novice and Advanced are no longer issued. New licenses get the next call sign in the sequential system. Getting a license by fraud is prohibited.
§97.19 Vanity call signs: Pick up to 25 calls in order; you get the first free one from your class group or lower. Expired and cancelled calls are held back for two years, with exceptions for close family of a ham who has died.
§97.21 Changes and renewals: Keep your name and addresses current, renew for another term, and a two-year grace period after expiry during which you may renew but not transmit.
§97.23 Mailing and email address: Your license must show a working mailing address and email address. Bounced FCC mail can cost you your license.
§97.25 License term: Normally 10 years.
§97.31 When a licensee dies: How family can ask the FCC to cancel the license, and when the call sign is cancelled.

Subpart B: Station Operation

How to run a station day to day: who is responsible, what you may and may not send, and how to identify.

§97.101 General standards: Operate by good engineering and good amateur practice. No frequency belongs to anyone. Emergency traffic always has priority. Never interfere on purpose.
§97.103 Station licensee responsibilities: The licensee is responsible for the station, even when someone else is at the controls (then both are). Show the station and records to the FCC on request.
§97.105 Control operator duties: Make sure the station operates properly, and only within the privileges of the control operator’s license class.
§97.107 Visitors from other countries: Licensed hams from countries with an agreement may operate in the US within their own license, never beyond Amateur Extra privileges.
§97.109 Station control: Local, remote and automatic control. Under local or remote control the operator must be at the control point.
§97.111 What you may send: Two-way contacts with other hams, emergency and relief traffic, and some one-way transmissions: tune-ups, calling CQ, code practice, bulletins, telecommand and telemetry.
§97.113 What you may not send: No pay or business traffic (with narrow exceptions like occasional gear for sale), no music, no codes meant to hide meaning, no obscenity, no false signals, no broadcasting, no regular service that other radio services could provide.
§97.115 Third-party traffic: Letting a non-ham speak or passing messages for them: fine within the US and to countries with an agreement, with the control operator supervising.
§97.117 International contacts: Keep contacts abroad to ham radio matters and personal remarks.
§97.119 Station identification: Give your call sign at the end of each contact and at least every 10 minutes during it, in English or CW (automatic CW ID no faster than 20 WPM). Add /AG or /AE while an upgrade is pending.
§97.121 Restricted operation: If you interfere with broadcast reception on good receivers, you can be told to stay off those frequencies in the evening hours and Sunday mornings.

Subpart C: Special Operations

Stations that do special jobs, many of them automatically.

§97.201 Auxiliary stations: Point-to-point links that are part of a system, such as a repeater’s control link.
§97.203 Beacons: One-way stations for studying propagation: 100 W at most, and where they may run unattended.
§97.205 Repeaters: Technicians and up may run a repeater. Not allowed in some segments, including 28.0-29.5, 50.0-51.0, 144.0-144.5 and 145.5-146.0 MHz. Repeaters may be automatically controlled.
§97.207 Space stations: Ham satellites and the ISS ham station: bands and rules.
§97.209 Earth stations: Stations that talk to ham satellites.
§97.211 Space telecommand: Controlling a ham satellite from the ground.
§97.213 Telecommand: Remote control of a ham station by radio.
§97.215 Model craft: Radio control of model planes, boats and cars on ham frequencies, at 1 W at most.
§97.217 Telemetry: Sending measurements back from a station.
§97.219 Message forwarding systems: Packet and similar networks that pass messages automatically: who is responsible when a bad message gets through.
§97.221 Automatic digital stations: Where unattended digital stations such as Winlink gateways may run: in set HF segments, or elsewhere only when answering another station and no wider than 500 Hz.

Subpart D: Technical Standards

The bands, the modes, and the power. Our Privileges Checker turns these tables into an answer for your class.

§97.301 Frequency bands by class: Which bands each license class may use, in each part of the world.
§97.303 Sharing requirements: Bands shared with other services. On 60 m only four channels and the 5.3515-5.3665 MHz band, 2.8 kHz wide at most. 2200 m and 630 m: fixed stations only, after notifying the Utilities Telecom Council.
§97.305 Modes allowed where: Which parts of each band allow data and which allow voice. CW is allowed anywhere you may transmit.
§97.307 Emission standards: Keep your signal clean and no wider than needed, plus special limits such as Technicians sending only CW on 80, 40 and 15 m and only CW and SSB voice on 28.3-28.5 MHz.
§97.309 Digital codes: Which digital codes are allowed (Baudot, AMTOR, ASCII and others), and the rule that the technical details of any other code must be public.
§97.311 Spread spectrum: Rules for spread-spectrum signals, where they are allowed.
§97.313 Power: Use the least power needed; 1,500 W PEP at most. Lower limits in some places: 200 W on 30 m and in the Novice/Technician HF segments, 100 W ERP on the 60 m channels, and more.
§97.315 Amplifiers: Amplifiers sold for ham use must be FCC-certified. Hams may build or modify their own, and used amplifiers may be sold to hams and dealers.
§97.317 Amplifier standards: The technical standards a commercial amplifier must meet.

Subpart E: Emergency Communications

When lives and property are at stake.

§97.401 Disasters: A special emergency channel for Alaska, and emergency drills.
§97.403 Safety of life and property: When normal communications are down, a ham may use any means available to help protect life and property.
§97.405 Station in distress: A station in distress may use any means to get help, and others may do the same to help it.
§97.407 RACES: The Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service: registered stations working for civil defense organizations.

Subpart F: Exams

How licenses are earned, and the volunteers who give the exams.

§97.501 What each class requires: Technician: Element 2. General: Elements 2 and 3. Amateur Extra: Elements 2, 3 and 4.
§97.503 The exams: Element 2 and 3: 35 questions, 26 to pass. Element 4: 50 questions, 37 to pass.
§97.505 Credit for past licenses: Credit for elements you already passed or once held, even for some expired licenses.
§97.507 Preparing an exam: Who may prepare which exams.
§97.509 Volunteer examiners: Exams are given by at least three accredited VEs, who must be 18 or older and hold a higher class than the exam (Extra for the Extra exam).
§97.511 Examinee conduct: Follow the VEs’ instructions, or the exam ends.
§97.513 Session manager: The VE in charge of the session.
§97.519 Coordinating sessions: How VECs organize sessions and send results to the FCC.
§97.521 VEC qualifications: Who can be a Volunteer Examiner Coordinator.
§97.523 Question pools: The public question pools every exam is drawn from.
§97.525 Accrediting VEs: How VECs accredit volunteer examiners.
§97.527 Expenses: VEs and VECs may be reimbursed for their costs.

Summaries written by OneShack from the official text, checked September 23, 2026. The rules themselves are public domain. Not legal advice; the official text on eCFR is what counts.