Prepper Forum

Amateur radio can go the distance off-grid, particularly HF. However, you and the other person/s need to be licensed in order to use those bands. Why licensed? That gives you the opportunity to practice your skills and develop your gear before disaster happens. Also, even if HF can propagate through the ionosphere, it is still dependent on band conditions. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's dead. It's also one reason that having a lot of practice will play a big part in your success.

Otherwise, for 50 miles, a good fixed station with a directional antenna for BOTH stations and good line-of-sight (depends on terrain) is possible using VHF or UHF. Or, a repeater can also help you go the distance if you are using a portable (handheld) or mobile radio. These will of course require a power supply (can be off-grid solar + batteries), as well as a good antenna setup.

Define "communicate".

With who?

Over what distance?

Also for what kind of scenario?

There's probably some more things to define first, which will help guide a solution.

In a nutshell, over short/local distances (1/4 mile to perhaps 5 miles under ideal conditions, which never happen), GMRS can be used. It's easy to learn. But it's very range limited in general.

You could setup your own repeater on something high, and get miles of range then (I regularly pickup folks 10+ miles away because there's a repeater half way between us on a tall building).

Long distance, HAM/HF. But that's very complex, you really have to learn quite a bit to make that happen, and whoever's on the other end would need similar skilset.

CB can do significant distance too.

With any radio, the higher the antenna, the farther the reach - that's the primary driver.

Radio is a helluva rabbit hole, but I'd recommend starting with GMRS - radios are fairly inexpensive, you can get started for about $100 if you find a deal on a radio 2 pack (and not the cheap blister pack crap, something like TidRadio or better).

Cell phones are just radios that link to a repeater nearby - the cell tower. That tower then links to the phone network, typically via cable.

I have a few 2 way radios, ham radio, emergency satellite communicator for search and rescue.

Lots of people have been getting into such as the lilygo t-deck, I might get a few of them some day.

I also have a cell phone booster and a digital TV tuner, just in case.