Programming Baofeng UV-5R Repeater Offsets

The Baofeng UV-5R and its myriad variants are inexpensive hand held VHF/UHF radios that could give any new ham operator immediate access to local repeater traffic. Unfortunately, it's not the most user friendly radio to program by hand. Programming repeater settings in particular can leave you scratching your head if you're not aware of the quirks of this radio.


The three primary parameters that need to be programmed into the radio for successful repeater access are the repeater TX frequency (i.e. the frequency your radio will receive), the offset, and the CTCSS tone or squelch tone of the repeater, if any. The offset is the difference between the TX and RX frequencies of the repeater. For 2 meter VHF, the offset is generally +/- 600 kHz from TX, and for 70 cm UHF it's generally +/- 5.000 MHz.

Let's pretend we want to use a theoretical repeater at 144.100 MHz with +600 kHz offset and a 77 Hz squelch tone. Such a repeater might be listed in a directory as "144.100+ 77Hz tone".

The UV-5R has two primary operating modes: memory and VFO. You can toggle between the modes by pressing the [VFO/MR] button. When in VFO mode, you can listen to a repeater by setting the radio's frequency to the TX frequency of the repeater, in this case 144.100 MHz. In order to transmit to the repeater, then UV-5R needs the squelch tone and TX offset. First, press the [A/B] button if needed to select the top VFO. Only this one can be saved to a memory channel.

To set the squelch tone:

1. Press [MENU], followed by 1 3 to jump to menu item 13, T-CTCS (TX CTCSS)
2. Press [MENU] again to select the menu and then the [UP] or [DOWN] to select 77.0 Hz
3. Press [MENU] one last time to save the TX CTCSS setting.

To set the radio's TX offset direction:

1. Press [MENU] and jump to menu item 25, SFT-D (shift direction)
2. Press [MENU] again and then the arrows buttons to select either "+" or "-" depending on which way the repeater offsets. Since our theoretical repeater has a plus offset, set SFT-D to "+".
3. Press [MENU] to save the offset direction.

Now the direction of the radio's TX offset is set, but not its magnitude. To set the offset frequency:

1. Press [MENU] and jump to menu item 26, OFFSET
2. Press [MENU] to select the menu item and then enter 0 0 6 0 0 on the numeric keypad to set the offset to 600 kHz. If you wanted a 5 MHz offset for a 70 cm repeater, you would have entered 0 5 0 0 0.
3. Press [MENU] to save the offset

Now the radio is ready for duplex communication with the repeater. Press [* SCAN] briefly to show the TX frequency. The radio should read 144.700 if everything is set up correctly.

You probably want to save it to a memory channel so you can quickly access later. Select menu item 27, MEM-CH, and use the direction arrows to select an empty memory channel. Press [MENU] again to save the settings in that memory position.

Switch to memory mode and select the memory channel you just saved. You should see the RX frequency (the TX frequency of the repeater) displayed. Press [* SCAN] briefly to show the TX settings for accessing the repeater. First notice the CT indicator that appears on the left side of the screen indicating that a CTCSS tone will be send when the radio transmits. Also notice that the TX frequency is the same as the RX frequency. No, you didn't do anything wrong, the radio doesn't store the TX frequency shift direction and offset in memory. Don't ask me why. It's one of the radio's quirks. One of the other quirks is that you can't change the RX frequency in a memory channel without first erasing the whole memory channel, but you can change the TX frequency without erasing everything else. To set the radio's TX offset in the memory channel, follow these steps:

1. Go back to VFO mode. The radio should still be receiving on the TX frequency of the repeater (144.100 MHz).
2. Change VFO A to 144.700 MHz. Don't bother changing the SFT-D or OFFSET in the menu.
3. Save over the same memory channel that you saved previously without erasing it first
4. Go back to memory mode. The +- indicator should appear above the frequency display
5. Press [* SCAN] briefly and the radio should switch from 144.100 MHz to 144.700 MHz. 

Congratulations, you've successfully stored repeater settings in the UV-5R. You can store settings for other repeaters simply by setting the RX frequency and squelch tone, saving to a memory channel, then switching the VFO to the desired TX frequency and saving to the same location. Don't bother with menu items 25 and 26. I just had you try them so you could experience the same appreciation for our friends at Baofeng that I did.