I have a GMRS license and radio, and plan to have an amateur technician class license in a few weeks, which was the reason for this purchase.I own a Yaesu FT-2900R that is currently being used as an excellent VHF scanner, while waiting on the license exam.A local ham operator, who is currently serving as my mentor, also helped me do some of the following VSWR measurements, interesting results.VSWR measured with a MFJ-874 meter. The antenna is only mounted 1 foot above roof top. Fifty feet of RG-8x cable feed line. We used a 5 Watt TX power setting for the tests.2 Meter at 146.550 = 1.1 : 170 Centimeter at 446.520 = 1.15:1At my request we also tested some of my current radios.GMRS at about 462.5 = 1.15:1MURS at about 151.8 = 1.4:1This antenna has a fairly wide bandwidth. It also makes an excellent scanner receive-only antenna for the VHF bands.I wanted a low profile antenna that I could use on 2 meters without scaring the neighbors. This one made me happy. Hit a 2-Meter repeater, 18 miles away and get a Q5, with 5 watts. That is all I need.enjoyUpdate:I have been a licensed ham for while now. This is pretty much all you need for 2 Meters and 70 Centimeters :) K6WGXWhat an improvement over a Magnet mount Mobile Antenna on a metal roof. I recently decided to get back into Amateur Radio after a hiatus of about a year. I only had an old 70cm 16 channel Kenwood mobile and wanted to upgrade....Always wanted a dual band radio so I bought one, and decided that it was time for a Base Station antenna to go with the new Rig. Looked all over Amazon and came across this little beauty, Ordered it and it was here a day earlier than promised. Immediately put it up and got on the air and WHAT A DIFFERENCE!!!! I can hit repeaters 40 miles away with this antenna only at about 20 ft to the tip. Good audio reports from people signal strength tripled over the mobile mount on the metal roof. Ordered my first Quad band radio and am loving the receive signals I am getting with this little beauty. at only about 4 feet high and the ground radials its a winner, so much so I jacked it up another 5 feet and now it's like a whole new world has opened, I would HIGHLY recommend this Antenna!!!Works very well. I put this on a 10 foot conduit stick lashed to a chain link fence post. I have 25 feet of RG 8 going to a feed through and another 6 feet of RG 8 to the swr/power meter. the swr never goes above 1.5/1 on VHF on my MFJ 259b analyzer. I do not have UHF/440/70 cm measurement capability to measure swr there. I live in the Sacramento mountains in New Mexico so my repeater performance is of no value in cities or flatlands so is not included. I do receive fixed stations such as the sheriffs office and other public service stations better than a 3dB mag mount antenna. Please do not expect results similar to a Yagi or log periodic as this is an omni directional antenna. The construction is first rate, possibly equal to commercial antennas that I have installed/worked on.So I am new in the amateur radio and I found this. Read the reviews and found the expert advice that I should not believe any claims about distance. I'm using a Yaesu FT-60 5 watt handheld radio. This antenna does a wonderful job. I struggled to reach a nearby town prior to receiving this antenna. Working with some other HAMs I managed to get the antenna up to about 30 feet at the top. My friend in the nearby town says I am clear now. We can even talk simplex. Last night I managed to get on 3 nets, first from the nearby town, second my own county and third, a county about 21 miles away. Now don't take that it will reach 21 miles every day on 5 watts, but the conditions were just right last night. As a new HAM I would highly recommend this antenna for starters. Make sure you get this antenna up as high as possible and I doubt you will be disappointed.Can't beat it for the price. I have the antenna mounted 25 feet up on the end of 50 feet of RG8X. Though I'm not happy about the feed-line losses on the RG8x (about 40%), the antenna gain more than makes up for it. With just 3 watts of VHF power going into the antenna I can still hit repeaters clearly at 40 miles distance. As others of stated, the higher you mount this antenna the better the results. Unfortunately UHF transmission over this set-up has not improved over my mobile antenna, probably due to feed-line losses again. Since I'm using a low power HT with this antenna, the next time I'm going to purchase higher quality coax feed line, such as LMR-240 to reduce losses. BTW - the antenna is black in color, not white.This antenna is very compact and is matched fairly well over both bands. My only concern is the input connector. This connector does not have a dielectric around the center pin and thus the pin has no support to keep the "fingers" from spreading out and breaking off -- these pins are made of beryllium copper and are very brittle. To compensate, I put an adapter -- UHF male to UHF female -- at the input and intend to leave it there. The antenna was delivered much sooner than I was told it would be. Only time will tell about the longevity of this antennaWhat a great antenna. Works much better than my other more expensive antenna. Mounted on a 5 foot piece of double wall pvc Mounted the mast in a tripod I had in the house. Tested at 15W with a SWR of 1. 1. Able to reach all repeaters within range. Suitably impressedI got the antenna and the packing for it was poor, had it been anything else it would have been broken, I open the box and checked all the parts and found NO instructions, and nothing on the web. I've installed antennas before so I had no problem but if this is your 1st one take your time.It's not a big antenna but it puts out like one, This vendor shipps slow, does not pack this item well but the antenna is worth the price and does the job.UPDATE: Installed the Antenna after putting the antenna up on the roof total height 40 feet, I ran my Analyzer on the antenna, from 144 thru 149 the SWR's never went above 1.3:1 and a 99% match and X=0 and 146.5 and that haappens to be Freg. area that I use. The Antenna is super after you get past all the other stuff.