PL880 Portable Digital PLL Dual Conversion AM/FM Longwave Shortwave Radio with SSB (Single Side Band) Reception

Immediate note: My 880 purchased in July 2024 has a USB-C charging port. Not sure if that's in the description, but many old models were miniUSB. Pleasantly surprised. It's not high speed charging, but at least it can charge with any cable I have laying around. So far I'm really loving it! I haven't had a radio around the house for maybe ten years. Decided I wanted one that was a good radio first and foremost. Second, one that's shortwave capable just to try out shortwave listening. I'm in the suburban San Francisco Bay area living in a third floor, north facing apartment. Straight away, the speaker is excellent. I can easily pick up every FM radio station I know of in the bay area. And the sound is crystal clear. I've enjoyed just plopping it down in my home office to listen while I work and the speaker is very enjoyable and clear if you don't fully blast it. AM reception is also excellent, with adjustable bandwidth. For shortwave, wow! This is my first SW radio, but I've really enjoyed sitting on my balcony tuning around. In the evening I can easily pick up Radio New Zealand International on 17675 kHz! I've also caught broadcasts from China, Japan, Miami, Maine, and others. On my second night I also picked out and tuned in a ham transmission and dialed it in on upper sideband mode. Loud and clear, coming from West Calgary! The included wire antenna I find helps me detect faint signals but also all noise. Not unexpected. Usually I have the best luck finding a broadcast with the wire then switching to the whip/telescoping antenna and moving to get the best signal with minimum noise. The rechargeable 18650 Li-ion is also awesome. Can easily replace with standard cells if needed, but also a long life rechargeable. Buttons and knobs are all very well thought out and intuitive. Even has a line out jack if you wanna use a stereo or record. The hidden features (do a Google search) only add extra value. Overall, I love it! Money well spent! Very impressive handheld radio, great quality, excellent results.

This very sensitive and selective radio receives AM, FM, Long Wave, and Shortwave broadcasts. Although it is easy to operate, it has a huge array of features. The Tecsun PL-880 is easily the best and most expensive of the small Tecsun radios. See Picture of Tecsun Radios. SOUND By using a better 450mW audio amplifier (thanks, Dan) and an improved 3 watt mylar speaker, the PL-880 has the best sound of these radios. High frequencies are crisp and clear, low frequencies are audible, and the midrange is exceptionally clear. FM Stereo is available through the headphone jack. POWER The unit is powered by a 5V USB port or a rechargeable, replaceable 18650 lithium battery. This is a huge deal. With heavy use and the back-light on, the factory-supplied 2000mAh battery lasts me about 15 days. When it does discharge, I can just recharge it in the radio, or swap it out with another inexpensive, long lasting 18650 battery. I just swapped out my 2000mAh 18650 with a 5000mAh 18650. Note that this is better than using AA batteries to get 4.8 volts, because the amperage isn't cumulative. If you use 4 AA batteries that are rated at 1600 mAh at 1.2v to get the required 4.8 volts, you still only have 1600 mAh, just at 4.8 volts. BACK-LIGHTING Because of the long-lasting battery, the back-light of the display can be turned on indefinitely. Alternatively, you can choose to have it only stay on for a few seconds (after you touch a knob or button), or just turn it completely off. A long press on "5" when the radio is off, toggles the light's behavior. Likewise, you can use a switch on the side. TUNING Tuning for all bands is easily accomplished with separate main tuning and fine tuning knobs. This is a great arrangement, far better than the auto switching tuning speed of the PL-660. Frequencies can be directly entered through the key pad. In addition, you can scan to the next/previous station with a long press to the SCAN button. Direction of scan depends on whether you were last manually tuning up or down. MEMORIES There are 100-250 memories per page per band (FM, AM, LW, SW, SSB), and there are 25 pages (0-24). Since many stations are only available for a limited time, I use each page (0-23) to group broadcasts available at that hour. An auto sort function will sort memories by band and frequencies, eliminating duplicates. Auto Tuning Storage (ATS) will automatically find and remember all stations available for a single band, or search all bands. OTHER FEATURES Many other convenience features include a sleep timer, an alarm clock, 8 band widths, direct keypad entry, simple tone control, line-out for recording, a headphone jack, an internal ferrite bar AM antenna, and an external antenna jack. In addition to the many features listed in the "Operation Manual", techies are delighted to find many more hidden features like Synchronous Detection, Dynamic Noise Reduction, Muting Threshold, Line Output Level, Calibration of SSB, Antenna Source, Firmware Version Display and date, "up" time, and charge time. Accessories include an Operation Manual, a lithium rechargeable battery, a long wire external antenna, a wall charger, and a very nice leatherette case. The knobs turn very smoothly with a nice damped motion and ergonomic placement. INTERNATIONAL BROADCAST BANDS If you follow the reception hints below, you'll find interesting stations like Austria, Australia, Cameroon, Deutsche Vella, Greece, Japan, Radio Marti, Quebec, Romania, Slovakia, Turkey, Tirana, Vietnam, etc. You can find these broadcasts in the vicinity of 2300-2495, 3200-3400, 3900-4000, 4750-5060, 5900-6200, 7200-7450, 9400-9900, 11600-12100, 13570-13870, 15100-15800, 17480-17900, 21450-21850 and 25600-26100. When you key in any of these frequencies, the PL-880 will tell you the meter band. AM You can use this radio for DX (distant) reception of AM stations that will surprise you. Get outside. You might even try an external AM antenna like the Kaito AN-200 Tunable Passive AM Antenna for AM radio, Any Brands, Like Kaito,Sony,Eton,Panasonic,Tecsun,Grundig Etc. . Inexpensive and great fun. SINGLE SIDE BAND Single Side Band (SSB) is where the ham broadcaster uses only half (lower or upper) the channel that he would otherwise use. This allows more broadcasters in the same vicinity but sounds garbled without the proper decoder. This radio will allow you to understand them by choosing either the upper or lower side band (USB/LSB). You can then fine tune the broadcast with the fine tuning knob and reduce noise by choosing the best of 5 alternative band widths (4, 3, 2.3, 1.2 and 0.5 kHz) especially chosen for SSB mode. Most digital radios (including this one) are callibrated to the nearest khz. However the PL-880 will display hundreths of a khz on SSB, and you can easily calibrate it so the that ham band SSB transmissions are dead on. Say that most transmissions sound clearest at 0.15 above the khz, for example 7060.15 on LSB. All you have to do is fine-tune it for the clearest sound and hold down the "Snooze" button for a few seconds. The .15 will turn to .00 and your radio will be calibrated to the "zero beat" for virtually all LSB stations. You can repeat for the USB and your SSB stations will be easily tuned and clear. Typically, the Lower Side Band is used below 10MHz and the Upper Side Band is used above 10MHz. Ham Radio is very popular. You can find these amateur broadcasts in the vicinity of 1843-2000, 3790-3800, 3885, 7290 and 14286 kHz. RECEPTION HINTS Just tuning randomly may not be rewarding. o Get a phone app for Short Wave Listening like SWBC, or use your browser to find Shortwave Listening guides. o Search for particular stations on their own frequencies and recommended times. o Get away from electrical interference like your computer or USB charger. o Try the long-wire antenna outside. Better still, make a simple dipole antenna by stretching some 18 AWG wire in opposite directions and connect one end to the Left terminal of a 3.5mm connector, connect the other wire to the GND connector. A solderless connector makes it easy. BCP 5pcs 3.5mm (1/8inches) Stereo Audio Male to AV 3-Screw Terminal Female Connector See picture, below. o Reception is better in the evening and at night. However, if you have a good antenna, you'll find good things all day long. o Find the best bandwidth for your broadcast. RECORDING You may want to record the marvelous stories from Slovakia and Romania of things only found there. In the last photo, I show how I record from the "line out" output to the "mic in" of the voice recorder by using a headphone volume control like Stellar Labs 35-4180 In Line Headphone Volume Control . The volume control reduces the line level of the radio, making it suitable for the microphone-level input of a voice recorder like ALS Portable Rechargeable 8gb Hd/vox/sto Stereo Professional Digital Voice Recorder with Double-mode of WAV and Mp3 . DRAWBACKS o Ideally, you would have a variable RF gain control to adjust radio sensitivity to the strength of the station. Instead, this radio has 3 position switch for Local, Normal, or DX reception. o The sync detector is poor, hardly ever improving the reception. o You must send the radio to Kaito to get a free firmware update; you cannot do it yourself. o The frequencies and mode are memorized, but you cannot add text. o FM sounds great in mono or stereo, but there is no RDS (Radio Data Service), or HD radio. o The display back-lighting is great, but does not illuminate the keys. o Unlike more expensive radios, you cannot control this radio with your computer. o All but the most recent samples with firmware version 8820 have the minor, but annoying "Fine Tuning Bug". Within a khz, the fine tuning will tune (but not display) backwards while tuning SSB. Just because the radio has version 8820 of the firmware, doesn't mean this bug is fixed. Check with the vendor or Kaito if you are concerned. My radio does not have this bug. FOR THE SAME MONEY If you listen to distant AM stations or Shortwave, the PL880 is well worth the money, currently rated 4.6/5 by Amazon buyers. Another good radio in the same price range is the Eton Satellit Eton NGWSATB Satellit AM/FM with RDS and Shortwave Radio, Black , rated 3.9. A slightly less expensive contender is the Sony ICF-SW7600GR Sony ICF-SW7600GR AM/FM Shortwave World Band Receiver with Single Side Band Reception , rated 4.1. If you can afford to spend more, you might also check out the Sangean ATS-909X Sangean ATS-909X BK AM/FM/LW/SW World Band Receiver - Black , rated 4.0. Each of these competitors excel the PL880 in some ways (RDS, sync, display size), and may not equal the PL880 in other ways (battery, audio fidelity, back-lighting, band-width choices). You may find a trade-off that you prefer among them. MORE INFO These reviews contain great information. Check out Yahoo's Tecsun PL-880 group. Read the 23 great reviews at eham. (Google: "eham tecsun pl-880")

I have many radios, including several World Band Radios. I recently received my new Tecsun PL-880 and I Love it! The Sound is Amazing! The PL-880 is By Far the Best Sounding of ALL my portables. Since I have SW experience the ease of use of the PL-880 is relatively intuitive. The PL-880 is much easier to use than one of my other world band radios, which usually requires me to have my manual handy to recall certain functions, but not on the PL-880! The Build Quality is Solid. The Rolling Knobs on the side are of quality materials, and are pleasure to scroll through the bands. Their placement is logical also, from Tune, Fine, Volume top to bottom. At first I was leery of the 18650 Lithium Battery, only because I thought they would be hard to replace. Upon research, they are readily available, and reasonable priced. They even sell that size for Vape devices, so most smoke shops have them. The longevity of the battery itself is amazing...lasts for days per charge (several hours/day with dial light ON). Which brings me to the Dial Light feature. I love that that dial light can be made to stay on, most of my other radios it turns off after a few seconds if not dialing stations. Now the most important part, the reception....The kit comes with an external coiled extension antenna, I have not needed it at all. I have pulled in stations all over the globe (time of day, and atmospheric condition dependent) with just with the telescopic antenna itself. AM/FM locks in perfectly, and FM is especially amazing due to the amazing sounding speaker. I get many more am/fm stations than just my local stations normally heard on regular radios. The usb/lsb works very well, and is easy to use. I've ready some reviews that complain about the sync mode (easy to turn on, just hit the usb/lsb a second time), I'm not a pro, just an amateur SWL, and it seems to work as fine as or better than any of my other radios which have that feature. The kit itself is great also. It comes with a nice zippered protective case, One battery (wish there were two), USB charging cord, the external antenna, and a really cool two sided poster. One side shows the PL-880 and its functions, and the other side is Colorful Amateur Radio World Map, perfect for your wall of your listening room/garage. My only 2 wishes for this radio would have been Airband, and a Line In, so I can take advantage of its awesome speaker. The Pl-880 is a Fun, Solidly Built, Great Sounding, Quality World Band Radio, which was reasonably priced ($159 at time of my purchase) . I highly recommend the PL-880!

I wish the Tecsun PL-880 had RDS FM and HD-FM, instead of LW. There's nothing on Long Wave anyway, so why include it? LW is used for shoreline directional beacons. So what if HD-FM (which stands for High Density, not High-Definition) becomes the "AM Stereo of the 21st century"? I still feel it should be included in a radio at this price. There is no way to name presets, important when there are over three thousand of them.This radio has a few bandwidth selections for SW and SSB, but there should be more preset selections or ideally, the bandwidths for SW/SSB should be continuously adjustable and capable of storage in station presets memory. The removable Li-Ion battery lasts many hours, days really. The radio is charged via a mini USB instead of a typical wall adapter and connector, which would have been better given the fragility typical of mini USB connectors. Still, the battery does last a long time so it doesn't have to charge frequently. Also, note that USB chargers seem to produce obvious audible RF noise if operating this radio while charging. I couldn't get good reception indoors, so I had to string a Realistic Shortwave Antenna kit outside and solder a mini-phone connector for the radio's RF input. This came as a surprise, as I am in the country and didn't expect all the AC noise. If you live in an urban area the radio's apparent high sensitivity to AC noise junk may be disappointing. With the right antenna input (built-in, portable, or outside) and the RF switch set right, the reception is good, and the right combination of fine tuning and bandwidth selection reduces SW station fading on most signals. There are some red icons on the radio's front panel buttons which are not mentioned in the manual. Perhaps someone can comment here on how to access these. The Scan function doesn't seem explained properly so here it is; if the tuning knob was last set forward the radio will scan up, and if the knob was last moved to a lower frequency the radio will scan down (when Scan is pressed and held in both cases). If you quickly tap the Scan button, perhaps accidentally, it takes you to the Presets area thus losing whatever station you were just on, which is annoying. Its too bad worldwide SW is not what it once was (so it seems). The Internet is now the big thing. I couldn't find many popular stations, they just weren't there. Maybe a propagation thing. This radio will receive ham stations but the radio sometimes distorts in SSB on audio peaks. I am not sure if it is the radio itself or the ham operator but it is frequent. As a last note, the clock on my radio didn't keep accurate time. Most of the popular SW stations I couldn't receive, just too much buzzing and noise in the background. I don't think it's the radio, maybe it's antenna orientation. The Scan function frequently didn't produce many listenable results. Overall listening experience not as expected. Probably not radio fault, but AC harmonic RF noise and propagation problems plaguing reception as well as an overall decline in listenable stations worldwide. Of course this is just opinion. --------------------- Just wanted to add something to this review. After a year the radio's working fine. Reception is great but there's only one problem. With the exception of ham, there's fewer and fewer broadcast stations to listen to. If broadcasts are what you seek, such as those in a foreign language, shortwave is a dead end. The new frontier is Internet Radio. There are currently over 15,000 stations available from almost every country/state, genre, call sign, etc. You can receive IR on a computer or a separate table top receiver. A note on stand-alone internet radio's; these hardware boxes are not all the same. They rely on existing website radio databases like Reciva.com or Pandora. These services carry many radio stations but not all. I recently acquired a C Crane and as a typical WiFi radio, and compared to shortwave, I wish I had never bought a shortwave radio. Oh sure, the hams are ok to listen to, but like many others I was interested in SW for news and alternatives to typical FM/AM fare.

I received my Tecsun PL-880 just a week ago, and I have to say that from my perspective, it's the *almost* perfect portable shortwave radio! I came close to purchasing a Grundig SAT 750, but when that order was delayed, I opted for this radio instead. I'm certainly glad I did! I can't imagine how the Grundig could be much better, and this radio provides a more portable option. PRO's: * Amazing sensitivity on the SW bands. No matter the time of the day, the auto-scanning function seems to always pick up 40-50 (or more!) shortwave stations. And these are stations that are easily copied. (The only antennae I'm using is the $10 Sangean 'reel'. And it just runs up a corner of my room to the ceiling.) In the limited time I've operated the radio I've already copied Radio China (came "booming" in on the 22 meter band), Radio Australia, and several far eastern stations. (I'm located in the southern United States.) BTW, if you own an iPad, you can always check the frequency with the "SWBC Sked" app to ascertain the station you're currently listening to. * Very good SSB reception on the Ham Bands ... all the way through 10 Meters! I've seen some YouTube videos of this radio providing a "muffled" SSB experience, but I've had no such issues (Firmware 8820). The only thing I can think of that could cause that is having the selectable Bandwidth set to 1.2 kHz or lower. I keep it at 3 kHz for SSB. (BW Options for SSB are 4, 3, 2.3, 1.2, and 0.5 kHz. That alone is astonishing for a portable SW radio!) When switching to SSB mode, the regular tuning knob automatically switches to "slow" tuning mode (1 kHz steps) while the "Fine" tuning knob switches to "Ultra-fine". You can literally tune in 1/100 kHz steps! Needless to say, this makes it super easy to get good quality speech from SSB signals. The only problem I've seen with SSB is a bit of "splatter" for very strong signals. In those instances, I would like to have a RF gain control. The three-position antennae-attenuator switch will do the job here, but is not as convenient. In any event, that's a very minor quibble. This is still the best SSB I've ever experienced from a portable. * Very good scanning options. You can scan just one International shortwave band, or *all* the bands. Use "Page 0" for scanning, and just the most recent scan results are stored. You can then easily step through all the stations it found by simply turning the tuning knob. Only the International SW bands are scanned; it automatically skips over all the Ham Bands. Since shortwave conditions change hourly, this makes it real easy to find the current "hot" bands. * Great sound! The speaker sounds great and can easily fill a small room without straining. It almost makes me wish a Bluetooth option were available so I could run Pandora through it via my iPhone. (Maybe the next generation, perhaps?) * AM/FM --- The "AM" band is adequate. If I were serious about AM I would opt for an external antennae optimized for AM. FM is *great*! * As mentioned earlier, this radio has incredible bandwidth options for a portable. In AM/SW mode you have 9, 5, 3.5 and 2.3 kHz options available. A strong music AM station with the 9 kHz BW option engaged sounds absolutely amazing. For most AM listening I keep it on "5". I use "3" as the default for most SW listening. The SSB bandwidth options were mentioned above. It's just *great* having all these options! * Rechargeable battery with "intelligent" charging. You don't have to tell it how long to charge like some portables require. Charging is through a mini-USB port. The cable for charging was supplied, but not the charger itself. I just use my iPhone's charger, which works great. CONS: * As mentioned above, the only real feature I miss is a variable RF gain control. I think it could really help out with the SSB "splatter" mentioned above on strong signals. Again, the three-position "Ant Gain" control can help out here; it's just not as convenient to use. As far as CONS go, that's pretty much it as far as I'm concerned! Summation: I *Love* this Radio!!!

I’m very happy with this radio. The decision was complicated. I spent almost two months reading reviews and watching YT videos before finally deciding to buy the Tecsun PL880. The unit I received was brand new, and the battery seems to work properly. I’ve been testing it for a couple of days. From my location, the radio scans over 70 FM stations and 20+ shortwave bands (Japan, Spain, Germany, China, the US, and others) using only the included extension antenna. The sound quality is excellent, which was one of the main reasons I chose this model. One thing I noticed is that the battery indicator is not very precise. When the battery is about to run out, it can still show a full indicator and then the radio turns off shortly after. I’ve seen other reviews mention the same thing. For me this isn’t a big issue because once the radio is fully charged it lasts many hours. I’m still testing to see if the indicator becomes more accurate after a few more charge cycles. My unit uses USB-C charging. Overall, I don’t regret buying this radio at all. It was a difficult decision because there are many options available, both cheaper and more expensive than the PL-880, but so far I’m really enjoying it. In the future I might also try the PL-660 and PL-330, since they also have many good reviews.

Excellent radio, BUT... This radio is shipped with NO transformer to charge the battery or play the radio! I have never seen a transistor radio sold without the 110 VAC charger so that the radio could be used while plugged into a wall socket or used to charged the battery. All that is supplied is a hookup wire that connects to a USB. I kept looking and looking through the shipping box thinking I had somehow missed the transformer. Nope, none there. Now, what moron in the Tecsun company thinks that everyone who might want to use this radio wants to do it in conjunction with a computer or even has access to a computer with a USB port or some other didital device where they can plug in a USB every time they want to play the radio? I had no way to charge the supplied battery or even to play the radio until I went out and purchased a charger that had a USB connector to plug into the radio. Now the problem arises that whenever the charger is plugged into the radio, the resulting "hash" interference from the charger makes it impossible to even hear the radio! Therefore, I must first charge the battery before I can disconnect the charger, and then listen with the battery only to power the radio. What a collosal pain in the ass that is! So, what happens when this very unusual battery has gone through all the recharge cycles it can stand? The battery is NOT available in stores in Florida, so I guess it has to be shipped from Bum-Fuck China so I can listen to the radio. My previous shortwave radio was a very nice Eton 10 that came with a wall charger that was filtered and did not put out any interference. I am very disappointed that the ad did not warn me that there was no "wall wart" transformer designed for or included with this radio. Also the battery is some weird 4.5 volt, in an equally weird physical size that is not widely available in stores. It is obvious from this configuration that the Tecsun Company never intended for this radio to be played anyway other than with its proprietory battery. What a dumb arrangement this is. This will be my last Tecsun! Don't buy one.

When I was a teenager in the 1970s, I was an avid SW listener. The international broadcasts really opened up the world to me. I'm not quite sure how many years ago I sold my radio on eBay, but it's been many. I knew that many SW broadcasters had cut back because so much information passes through the internet. But I assumed there were some remote parts of the world that the traditional broadcasters wanted to reach. Was I wrong. It seems like here in North America, there's nothing to listen to in English but North American stations with a lot of evangelical preachers. I speak Spanish, so that opens up -- in addition to more preachers -- a chance to listen in on the battle between Radio Havana and Radio Martí. I bought an external antenna, but it just makes for louder preaching. (I haven't tried putting up a REAL antenna outside yet, but I'm not sure why I'd bother. I bet there are YouTube videos to help, though.) The weird thing is listening to shortwave and hearing that you can make your reception reports on the web. Makes sense, I guess, but it causes a lot of cognitive dissonance. Beyond that, I can listen in on boring ham operators on single side band. The SSB works better than any radio I had in the past. So that's all really just a review of the SW scene rather than the radio. I'm just saying -- if you're looking for the world of the twentieth century -- sorry, Charlie! So the radio itself -- way cheaper and way better than the fancy SW radio with digital tuning I bought from Radio Shack for $400 in the mid 80s -- quite a bit more than $1000 in today's dollars. Lots of things are adjustable to improve reception, like AM bandwidth, gain, etc., which would be a little obscure to a beginner but potentially very useful for a weak (or strong) signal. I can't complain at all about the radio. It's very highly ranked on all the SWL websites. The FM reception and sound quality is great. I assume MW reception is also good. (The radio includes LW, but I never heard a LW station in my life.) There's no Bluetooth. It would be nice to play straight into my hearing aids :( I guess to summarize -- if you're unfamiliar with the shortwave scene of 2023, read up and think carefully before plunking down the price of this receiver. Consider buying something for half as much to see if you're still interested. :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :(

タイトル通り、非常に気に入りました。欠点はバッテリーが特殊な事ぐらい。 このラジオ、チューニングダイアル、ファインチューニングダイアル、ボリュームコントロールが 右端にまとめて配置され、見ての通り、親指と人差し指でつまんで回せるタイプとなっています。 この配置とつまんで回せるという事が今のラジオでは非常に珍しく、使い勝手の向上に貢献しています。 Sonyの7600も所有していますが、使い勝手でPL880の方が気に入っています。 今、買うべきBCLラジオはこれです。

Excelente desempeño en onda corta y banda lateral, único con sintonía fina de dos dígitos. Cumple lo que promete. Lo mejor de todo es poder cambiar la frecuencia sin que se vaya el audio o los molestos “chuff” o sonidos de cambio de frecuencia. Podrían mejorar el rendimiento de la batería que aunque es recargable el consumo es alto. En general muy buen equipo para dxers.

I think I have bought this radio by mistake - I'm not sure if it is configured for UK - it does not pick up any AM stations - FM is fine - SW is not good.

Has very good reception on AM , FM and Amateur radio bands with SSB (Single side band ) . I have not used the memory feature yet but like the timed turn off because it helps me fall asleep and the radio turns off. I had to pick a 5 volt charging device but it does come with a mini USB plug in cord. It comes with a plug in external wire antenna and ear buds. Has a good instruction manual and a zippered leatherette carrying case . It has an easy to see display screen . I have had no reason to use the telescoping antenna yet as it has great reception for a small radio. It's approximately 7 1/2 inches (19 cm ) by 4 1/2 " ( 11 cm ) by 1 1/4 " ( 3 cm ) thick.

Good as expected.