Commonwealth Contest

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The Commonwealth Contest is one of the longest-running contests in the HF contesting world. It promotes contacts between stations in the Commonwealth Countries and Territories. Click here for background information. Click here for further information.

If you have any queries about these rules, please email hf.query@rsgbcc.org

Rule changes for 2025:

(1) The governance of the Commonwealth Contest is changing to be shared by Commonwealth National Amateur Radio Societies. RSGB will publish the contest rules, gather logs from entrants, adjudicate the contest and publish the results on their behalf.
(2) England, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Northen Ireland, Scotland and Wales now count as separate Commonwealth Call Areas
(3) Contest operation above 14060kHz has been clarified
(4) All antenna restrictions have been removed

Please Note:
Entrants must use their best endeavours to operate with a call sign that unambiguously represents the Commonwealth Call Area from which they are operating. This may be, for example, by adding a suffix to their call if the prefix is for an Area where they are not operating. In the event that this is not possible, they must provide the correct Commonwealth Call Area in the Soapbox to their log.

Please notify the RSGB Adjudicator by email using the following link (John G4CZB) if an ambiguous call sign must be activated so that this can be publicised prior to the contest, for the benefit of other entrants.

1. Objective

To achieve a good score by working as many stations and bonuses as possible. This unique contest provides a great opportunity to work Commonwealth DX for all participants.

2. Date & Time

8th - 9th March 2025
1000 - 1000 UTC

QSOs will not be accepted at or past the end time

3. Frequencies and Power

CW only

3.5, 7, 14, 21 and 28 MHz

On 3.5 MHz, below 3510 kHz has priority for intercontinental operation

On 14 MHz, Contest participants must not solicit QSOs by calling CQ, QRZ etc above 14060kHz

Only one signal may be transmitted at any one time

4. Entrants

(a) Only stations operating from areas in the Commonwealth Call Area list may participate in this contest.

(b) Scoring contacts may be made with any station in the Commonwealth Call Area list, apart from those within the entrant's own Call Area (except as explained in (d) below).

(c) Commonwealth Society Headquarters Stations, representing some Commonwealth Call Areas, will be active during the contest and will identify by sending 'HQ' after their serial number. Other HQ stations may be active to celebrate or commemorate events of significance to the Commonwealth. Each HQ station counts as an additional call area, and entrants may contact any HQ station (including any in their own call area) for points and bonuses.

(d) England, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Northen Ireland, Scotland and Wales are separate Commonwealth Call Areas (G, GU, GD, GI, GJ, GM, and GW). QSOs between stations in these Commonwealth Call Areas do not count for QSO points or bonus points.

(e) 'HQ' stations in England, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Northen Ireland, Scotland and Wales may be contacted for points and bonuses by all stations even if both stations are in the same Commonwealth Call area.

(f) Special Contest Callsigns or Club Callsigns may be used

(g) Operation must be from a single Station location where all transmitters, receivers, and antennas are located within a circle of a radius no greater than 500m

(h) Remote receivers outside the Station location are not permitted

(i) Remote Operation: There are two categories of remote operation.

(i.1) Remote operation of a station is allowed where the operator is situated within the same Commonwealth Call Area as the station. Additionally, an operator's home station located in a Commonwealth Call Area as shown in the licensee's licence documents, may be remotely operated from a location in another country. All such stations may enter any section except (c).

(i.2) Where the operator or operators are NOT situated within the same Commonwealth Call Area as the station (i.e. the operator(s) are situated anywhere else in the world), all such operations must enter section (c).

(j) A remotely operated station must obey all station licence, operator licence, and category conditions. The callsign used must be one issued or permitted by the Regulatory Authority of the remote station location.

(k)The address of the operator must be included in the 'Address of Operator when operating Remote from Station Address' box on the Station Information Page and the address of the remote station must be included in the Cabrillo header 'ADDRESS:' box.

5. Sections

(a) High Power, Single Operator, Unassisted - 12-hour or 24-hour - Maximum legal power (HP-SOU)

(b) High Power, Single Operator, Assisted - 12-hour or 24-hour - Maximum legal power (HP-SOA)

(c) High Power, World-wide remote activation of a Commonwealth Call area, Single or multi-operator. Assisted - 12-hour or 24-hour - Maximum legal power (OPEN-REMOTE)

(d) Low Power, Single Operator, Unassisted - 12-hour or 24-hour - 100W maximum (LP-SOU)

(e) Low Power, Single Operator, Assisted - 12-hour or 24-hour - 100W maximum (LP-SOA)

(f) QRP, Single Operator, Unassisted or Assisted - 24 hour only - 5W maximum (QRP)

(g) Multi-operator - Assisted - 24 hour only - Maximum legal power (MULTI-OP)

(h) HQ stations - Multi-operator - Assisted - 24 hour only - Maximum legal power (HQ)

Note 1: In the 12-hour category , off-periods must be a minimum of 60 minutes in length

6. Team Competition

(a) A Team consists of up to five stations. In addition to Australia, Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand and Rest of the Commonwealth teams, any Commonwealth country or geographical region may enter one or more teams.

(b) An individual station may represent only one team, and may compete in the High Power, Low Power, QRP, or Multi-operator Section. Each contributing station's log must be submitted in the normal way.

(c) Each team shall have a Captain , who must submit a list of callsigns of team members to commonwealth.contest@rsgbcc.org before the start of the contest. Team membership may be amended until the contest is under way.

(d) Stations in the 'Rest of the Commonwealth' team(s) may only be drawn from countries or regions not submitting their own team.

(e) Each team member is competing as a single-operator or multi-operator within the overall contest. No passing of information between team members during the event is permitted, except that team members may contact each other for points and/or bonuses where the contest rules allow.

7. Exchange

(a) RST plus Serial Number starting at 1 and incrementing by 1, irrespective of band; entrants will not be penalised if their sent serial numbers are logged slightly out of sequence

(b) HQ stations additionally send 'HQ' which must be logged

(c) Entrants are encouraged to call “CQ CC” when looking for QSOs in the contest

(d) Please log any exchange that you are sent to the best capability of your logging facility; if you are not sent an exchange, log a zero

8. Scoring

(a) Each QSO with a station in the same continent scores 5 points

(b) Each QSO with a station in a different continent scores 10 points

(c) A bonus of 20 points is earned for each of the first three contacts with a Commonwealth Call Area on each band.

(d) Commonwealth Contest Team Competition scoring: The team score is the sum of individual adjudicated scores, with all stations located in the southern hemisphere or on the equator having their final score multiplied by a Latitude Factor.

(e) This Latitude Factor will be recalculated each year based on published scores. For each hemisphere, the highest-scoring team total for each of the last three years will be used to give an overall total and the factor will be calculated as the ratio of the northern to the southern grand totals rounded down to the nearest two decimal places.

9. Log Submission
and Adjudication

(a) Submit in Cabrillo format here within 5 days following the end of the contest

(b) View the correct Cabrillo format for this contest

(c) If the robot finds format errors, it will reject the log and ask for resubmission of a corrected logfile. Second and subsequent log uploads may be subject to analysis of any changes that have been made.

(d) If you have difficulties preparing or uploading your Cabrillo logfile, please contact the contest adjudicator to ask for assistance, before the submission deadline.

(e) Adjudicated results will be online and will include online logfiles for all entrants.

(f) Errors will incur penalties as outlined in the RSGB HF Adjudication Principles. This penalty will be the loss of 5 additional QSO points (suject to ratification by the Commonwealth Contest Committee).

(g) The use of CAT Control to log the correct frequency and mode is highly recommended - you will lose QSO points for frequency and mode errors.

10. Results and Awards

(a) Awards for this contest are shown here.

(b) Winners of awards will be indicated in the results tables complete with downloadable certificates.

(d) Single-operator entrants operating in England, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Northen Ireland, Scotland or Wales will have their scores entered automatically into the RSGB HF Championship.

11. Supplementary Rules

(a)		Any infringement considered to be outside the spirit of the contest may result in QSOs being disallowed, the entry being reclassified as a Checklog, or the entry being disqualified.
(b)		Call signs logged must be the same as those exchanged over the air by the entrants during the QSO. Correction of logged call signs and exchanges after the contest, by use of any database, recordings, email or other methods, is not allowed.
(c)		All requests for contacts, responses to calls, and copying of call signs and contest exchanges must be accomplished during the contest period using the mode and frequencies of the contest.
(d)		You must send your callsign at least every 3rd QSO and no less often than once a minute.
(e)		Proof of contact e.g. an MP3 audio recording, may be required as part of the adjudication process.
(f)		Entrants in England, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Northen Ireland, Scotland and Wales are required to use a Regional Secondary Locator (RSL) where it is necessary to clarify the entity from which they are operating. Stations operating from England may optionally use the RSL “E”. If no RSL is used e.g. M0HDG, G6XX or GB4ABC, the station will be assumed to be in England. The use of a misleading RSL will disqualify the entry.
(g)		Entrants in England, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Northen Ireland, Scotland and Wales may append their call sign with one of the following: /A (Alternative Address), /P (Temporary Location), /M (Mobile) or /MM (Maritime Mobile) and this will comprise part of the call with which they enter. Other suffixes used by UK stations, whether or not they are entrants, will be removed in adjudication and need not be logged.

12. Declaration

By entering the Commonwealth Contest you declare that:

(a)		Your station was operated strictly in accordance with the rules and spirit of the contest, within the conditions of your licence, and that the power output from your transmitter was no greater than that permitted in the section of the contest that you are entering.
(b)		You agree that decisions of the Commonwealth Contest Committee will be final in cases of dispute.
(c)		By submitting a log entry, entrants give the RSGB permission to score, amend, publish, republish, print, and otherwise distribute that entry by any means.

13. Adjudicator

John G4CZB

Updated 7th Match 2025