📅 The 52 week ham radio challenge - 2026 📻
Timeline:
- Challenges finalized: December 30, 2025 ☑️
- Bot online: December 30, 2025 ☑️
- Challenge launch: January 01, 2026 ☑️
52 weeks, 52 challenges. Can you master them all?
- This is meant to inspire you to extend your horizon in amateur radio by weekly challenges through the year that touch all aspects of ham radio (and related fields).
- A lot of the challenges may be trivial for some participants (because it is what they do all the time), but very challenging to others.
- Participants of the challenge are encouraged to help each other in any way possible. There's no cheating and you decide on your own success or failure.
- The challenges may be done in the suggested chronological order, or in any other way you like. For maximum synergy and fun in comparing how it's going, going chronologically is recommended!
- Participants are encouraged to post their progress, ideas, questions on Mastodon with the tag #hamchallenge. There is also an IRC channel: irc.libera.chat/#hamchallenge
- You're encouraged to make use of your own equipment as much as possible, but it is perfectly OK to use borrowed equipment, or use WebSDRs/KiwiSDRs or other remote setups.
- Progress is tracked by mentioning the @hamchallenge@mas.to bot on Mastodon in your toots:
- If you succeeded in a challenge, include HCnnS in your toot (where nn is the week). You will receive a point for the challenge.
- If you didn't succeed yet, you can still include HCnn in your toot about the challenge, and it will be linked.
- Are you not on Mastodon yet? There are several instances dedicated to Amateur Radio. Go to https://fediverse.radio/, pick your favorite and sign up!
- NEW: The leaderboard is shown below the table of challenges.
2026
Challenges
| Week | Type | Difficulty | Challenge | Toots / Finished by |
|---|
| 1 | 🖥️ | 🟢 | Make a QSO on a far-away repeater using Echolink!Download one of the Echolink apps and get going. You can even request a QSL card for such an uncommon connection. Which country did you talk to?
| 1 / 0 |
| 2 | 📻 | 🟠 | Make a QSO in a mode you are unfamiliar with!Try and find an uncommon digital mode or maybe make a CW-QSO on 2 m? Use your imagination and get on the air!
| 0 / 0 |
| 3 | 🖥️ | 🟠 | Understand how your antenna works!Not all antennas are equal, so why not research one of your antennas or an antenna you are interested in and try to understand how it works? A magnetic loop? What is its beam characteristic and pattern? Can it handle high power? Let us know! We are eager to hear what you find out.
| 0 / 0 |
Leaderboard
Credits (thanks for contributing): AF0AJ (Logo), DB7GKA, DC0IT/9A5RAY, DC1MTS, DF1CN, DF4OR, DF7CB, DJ3EI, DJ9AO, DK1BOU, DK4HAA, DL6PL, DL7LW, DL8ROB, DL9CE, DM5WK, DM6SB, DO4MR, DO7JZ, DO7PX, DO8EW, G7KSE, KB6NU, PA3DSB, Willi and others.
A project by Fabian Kurz, DJ6CW (@dj5cw@social.darc.de) and Phillip Kessels (@phikes@mastodon.social) - Last modified: December 31, 2025 09:08 UTC