If you’re looking to study for your first amateur radio licence, having a book on the subject can be a great help – for study on the move, for highlighting sections of interest, or just as a handy reference and revision guide.
The good news is that there are now several options for study books, guides and manuals – you can choose a printed manual sold from suppliers like Amazon, printable PDF guides, and eBooks for the Amazon Kindle platform (so that the guidebook can be with you all of the time in electronic format
On this page, we’ll cover the various options available to those starting out in amateur radio.
If you have any comments or suggestions, please add them in the comments section below.
HamTrain’s Foundation Study Guide
OK, we’re a little biased here as this is our own product. To support our free online course, we released a handy Foundation Study Guide in 2024. This includes diagrams, photos, tables and material from our successful online course that has helped over 12,000 students to study for their Foundation licence.
Our Foundation Study Guide covers the 2024 syllabus and is suitable for exams both before and after the syllabus change date of 1st September 2024.
The Guide covers the essentials and is broken down into sections that match our course modules. The guide ends with some handy tips on how to pass the Foundation exam, as well as a mock test. It also contains a handy glossary and an exam FAQ.
The Guide is a handy size, with over 80 pages covering both the syllabus and how to pass the Foundation exam.
Our Foundation Study Guide is available now from Amazon in two formats: Paperback and Kindle
RSGB’s Foundation Licence Manual for Radio Amateurs
We’re currently not recommending this book. A new version was released in July 2024 and it contains several errors, omissions, incorrect statements and information that is intended for higher levels of exams, making it more challenging for new students than it needs to be.
The RSGB’s “third edition” was released in July 2024, intended for exams on or after 1st September 2024. As with all RSGB training manuals, it’s not clear from the cover which version is which, meaning it’s common for students to be buying older manuals and studying from out-of-date versions.
The latest version contains 42 pages of study material, plus many additional pages of adverts. The Foundation Licence Manual (by the RSGB) is available from around £8 online from the following places:
- eBay Book Store (Paper format)
- Amazon (Paper format)
- Amazon (Kindle format)
- RSGB Bookstore (Paper format)
John Hislop’s Foundation Student Guide
Trainer John Hislop has released a range of free manuals in PDF format, including a Student Guide for Foundation.
You can download a free copy of this and other manuals from www.g0hrs.org/g7oho-training-manuals
RSGB’s Exam Secrets
The RSGB publishes a book of exam questions. This includes questions for all three licence levels. We’re currently not recommending this book as it is for exams before 1st of September 2024 only. A new version is in production, we understand, and we don’t advise purchasing out-of-date material.
At the time of writing, the book is available from Amazon (Kindle), or the RSGB (paperback):
- Exam Secrets for Radio amateurs (Paperback, from RSGB and Moonraker’s eBay store)
- Exam Secrets for Radio amateurs (Amazon Kindle)
- Exam Secrets for Radio amateurs (RSGB Book Store)
M0TZX’s Foundation Radio Revision Questions
This is an independent book containing over 200 mock questions for Foundation questions. As far as we know, the latest version is the 2022 edition, so may not cover the 2024 syllabus changes.
At the time of writing, the book is available from Amazon (Kindle), or the RSGB (paperback):
- Foundation Radio Revision Questions (Paperback, from Amazon)
- Foundation Radio Revision Questions (Amazon Kindle)
