One of the great radios released by Radtel over the last few months. The Radtel RT-920 is a bit of a jack of all trades. It’s mastery could possibly be its high quality air-band reception. Build quality is really good for the price. The radio is quite thick and chunky in the hand, and under the hood it does have quite an impressive specification. What a radio enthusiast would have needed a whole room / shack full of radio equipment to achieve in the past is now available in a handheld radio. Obviously not at the same quality as equipment by ICOM, Kenwood or Yaesu, but still, it is all there in a portable radio and can be heard quite well most of the time.

This radio is not the only one. There are now so many radios coming out of Asia that have the same capabilities. The Radtel RT-920 is similar to many. The same design and features are now copied throughout many radio brands coming out of China.

The Radtel RT-920 reminds me of a few radios. Most notably the BAJETON BJ-7800 and the BAJETON BJ-8300. These are basically the same radio as the Radtel RT-920. So the question is, who copied who. Or who came to market first. Who cares really. But it wasn’t either of these brands as far as I’m aware.

However, so many of these radios are excellent and perform really well for the price. Reviews reflect this. And for buyers from the Western world, as long as they perform well, are well made and reliable, they will be purchased in high quantities.

Some of the stand out features for the Radtel RT-920 are as follows. It has a very wide analogue receive range, from 0.153kHz to 999MHz with quite a few gaps. Short Wave, Medium Wave, Long Wave, USB, LSB, CW, Airband [excellent / true AM], 2 meters, 70-centimeters, all are covered. Out the box the radio can transmit on 136-174MHz and 400 – 480MHz.

RX / TX confusion

There are some conflicting specification reports. Some descriptions state that this radio can transmit on the CB frequencies and lower. This is not accurate. For HF [0 – 30MHz] the Radtel RT-920 does not transmit. Well, technically it can transmit on CB / 28MHz and 29MHz, but the harmonics are ridiculously high. So HF is pretty much receive only. And for receiving anything under 30MHz, the second antenna connection is used. There are two antenna connections on this radio. One of the knobs at the top of the radio screws off to reveal an antenna connection.

Colour screen

The display is excellent on this transceiver. Very bright and easy to read. Definitely one of the better colour displays seen on many of the cheaper radios.

Great speaker audio

Speaker is very good. Audio is very clear and quite loud if turned up high.

Programming

Bluetooth programming is available in this model. Programming software and the smartphone app has been reported to have a few minor niggles, but Radtel are on the case, improving it week by week. Generally they both work good enough for basic operation.

Transmitting abilities

Transmit power has been tested in UHF, and like almost all other radios from China and beyond, it does fall a bit below the advertised power. Instead of 10 Watts at full power it was 8 Watts and some change. Medium power was over 5 Watts, and low power was around 1 Watt. In VHF the results were lower overall. High power was approximately 6 and a half Watts. Medium Power was around 3.6 Watts. And low power was around 1.40 Watts.

Overall this is an excellent radio for the price. Accessories included are as follows. Desktop charger, USB-C cable for USB-C charging, belt clip, 2200mAh battery, antenna and manual. US and European plug options are available.