It is time for a fresh set of POTA awards. I think that most of you will agree with me that the official POTA awards program has gotten a little stale. It’s nice to achieve an award, but the increments get lost in the interface…how many Op2Op awards do I have with N4NYM? Hard to tell.
I also feel that many of the awards, like Hunted All States, are forgotten about once they are earned, since they never expire.
POTA News & Reviews is launching a new POTA Awards Program, to begin January 1st, 2026. I think it’s time to have some fun with new awards that are achievable yet challenging and above all, fun. When you think about it, POTA is a quirky niche of ham radio, and our awards should reflect that!
We are currently discussing the new awards on the POTA Forum and we’d love to have your input. Right now we’re brainstorming ideas, and as we move into December we’ll pick a handful of awards to fully develop for 2026. The program includes a website where you’ll be able to upload logs and instantly see the awards you’ve qualified for. It will also feature a leaderboard.
I hope that you’ll join in on the planning for this. We each have our own style of doing POTA and it’s not cool for a small group of people to build out awards that reflect their personal style…we want everyone to have fun! Come over and let us know what you would enjoy chasing.
