The most common hobby name given to amateur radio is ham radio, which is a big part of the international communications as a complex system. Public service and recreation are the elements that stimulate the activity of the service participants, furthermore, ham radio proves priceless in times of crisis, emergency or disaster. Estimations indicate that some six million people around the world are regularly part of ham radio, and although the purpose of broadcasting is not commercial, their reward is the ability to get on air. It is the non-commercial feature the one to distinguish ham radio from other radio stations, and not the lack of skills as one may believe.

Ham radio probably gets back to the 19th century or the beginning of the 20th when ninety amateur stations serviced Canada and the United States. The appearance of ham radio is tributary to hobby practices and experiments, and one cannot deny that very often, amateur radio founders have given significant contributions to science, services and industry. Moreover, plenty of emergency cases had a happy end because of the intervention of ham radio operators.

Ham radio uses the Morse code in its more classic forms, but basically, the AM and FM frequencies remain the most popular particularly for local or regional amateur radio stations. Presently, computers have changed the evolution of ham radio for ever, with the introduction of the digital modes and the development of the packet radio. Last but not least, ham radio operators manage to use the low power communications on shortwave bands to stay in real-time mode.

Ham radio through satellite signal is no longer out of reach with the existence of the orbiting satellites carrying amateur radio (OSCAR); all one needs is a basic hand-held transceiver to make the broadcast possible. Another interesting aspect is that ham radio operators use the aurora borealis and the moon for the reflection of the radio waves. It was a real pleasure for some ham radio operators to get in contact with the International Space Station that counts licensed radio amateurs among the crew members. Discussions are in fact common practice among the individual hams who get on-air just to join one meeting or another.