What is the use of the walkie talkie long antenna?

Walkie-talkies are nearly half a century earlier than mobile phones,  today's mobile phones have already without an external antenna, but walkie-talkies still use a long antenna. Do you know why? In fact, this starts with the working frequency of the walkie-talkie.

First, we should clarify a concept: the higher the frequency, the shorter the wavelength, and the shorter the antenna.

The mobile phones we usually use usually communicate on the two frequencies of 900MHz and 1800MHz, while the working frequency of our walkie-talkies is between 400-470MHz. In order to transmit the radio signal as much as possible, a longer antenna is needed.

Because the frequency is lower, the wavelength of the corresponding frequency will be longer, and the wavelength is equal to the speed of light divided by the frequency. If the antenna can transmit an intercom signal with the highest energy possible, it needs to be designed as a "wavelength/2" size. Compared with mobile phones, if the frequency is 10 times lower, the corresponding wavelength will be 10 times higher, and the size of the antenna will be longer.

So in general, the longer the antenna, the better. On the other hand, although the signal is very important, the design of the mobile phone cannot blindly pursue the signal. As long as it can communicate, battery life, screen, camera, etc. are the most important. Walkie-talkies are different. The communication effect is always the highest priority.

Although mobile phones do not have the long external antennas of the early days, the antenna is actually transformed from the outside into an internal hidden antenna through industrial design. In this way, it can be said that the effective size of the antenna is maintained and the communication can be effectively carried out.

The primary principles of the design of walkie-talkies are good signal transmission and reception capabilities, reliability, and relatively low requirements for portability and aesthetics. Under such conditions, a large-sized raised antenna is acceptable. In fact, in the era of the cellular phone, because it was a new thing, everyone did not have high requirements for the appearance of the mobile phone. At the same time, the base station signal coverage was not as wide as it is now. Therefore, the cellular phone of that era also had an antenna and could even be retractable.

In the process of communication, the walkie-talkie does not rely on the network signal of the mobile phone operator, and the use scene does not have particularly high requirements on the appearance. The significance of the communication effect is absolutely higher than the appearance design. Moreover, the operating frequency of the walkie-talkie is much higher than that of the mobile phone, so a larger and longer antenna is needed to send the signal better.

Although both walkie-talkies and mobile phones use radio waves for transmission, the antennas are indeed different. In addition to their own frequency levels, they also have a lot to do with their purpose and scenarios.