The Baofeng UV-21 comes in three flavors, the standard UV-21, the UV-21R, and the UV-21 Pro. The only difference, I have found so far, is that the Pro comes with the new menu system and GPS. The rest of the radio appears identical, and in fact, sitting on my desk turned off, I can’t tell the difference.
Now that we know they are all basically the same radio, are they any good?
The first thing that threw me about the Baofeng UV-21 is that the screen does not look like the pictures. In the ads you see a black screen with white text, unless you are looking at the Pro, in which case it is white text on a blue background.
The Baofeng UV-21 comes in three flavors, the standard UV-21, the UV-21R, and the UV-21 Pro. The only difference, I have found so far, is that the Pro comes with the new menu system and GPS. The rest of the radio appears identical, and in fact, sitting on my desk turned off, I can’t tell the difference.
Now that we know they are all basically the same radio, are they any good?
The first thing that threw me about the Baofeng UV-21 is that the screen does not look like the pictures. In the ads you see a black screen with white text, unless you are looking at the Pro, in which case it is white text on a blue background.
The radio I have has the screen layout shown in the ads for the Baofeng UV-21 and UV-21R, but with blue text on a white background. It isn’t bad, but it is not what they advertise. Of course this is not the first time this has happened, I remember years back when the same thing happened on a UV-5R variant showing a black screen with gray text (inverse LCD) and when it arrived it was just like the UV-5R, black text on a gray screen.
Moving on, the Baofeng UV-21 is a fairly tall radio, not much bigger than a UV-5R in width and thickness, but quite a bit taller. This allows for a 2500mAh rated battery and a lot more comfort in the hand. The slight tilt of the PTT button help with this feeling and makes the radio just kinda fall into the right place in your hand. Both the PTT button and the port cover are textured to allow for excellent grip.
Buttons on the front of the Baofeng UV-21 are reasonably consistent in feel, and although I think they might have a tad too much resistance, they do have a nice little click when activated. On Baofengs in the past, there was often a noticeable difference in the resistance and/or click from one part of the keypad to another. It is nice to see this addressed.
The volume knob is nice and smooth, with a clear click for the power on/off. It has a nice pattern on it that makes it easy to grip and it maintains its distance from the side of the radio, making accidental volume adjustments less likely.
When it comes to the screen, that is a mixed bag. It is large, and colorful, but it seems to be less sharp than some of the newer screens and in my opinion, the layout wasted a lot of space. I would have removed the word MENU from the bottom, and moved the VFO indication from the right side to above the frequency. This would allow me to stretch out the frequency number in both heighth and width, making it far easier to read at a glance.
Speaking of the display on the Baofeng UV-21, the font is weird. When you go into the menu, any dropping letters like lower case P, Q, Y, and G, do not go down below the other letters like they should, instead the are on the line standing up. It doesn’t stop you from reading it of course, but it is a little jarring.
Another complaint I have about the Baofeng UV-21 is the battery. Now I have several Baofeng radios with this style battery, and all but this one can use a regular sized flathead screwdriver. What I mean is that when using a screwdriver whose tip is as wide as the slot, it is too thick to fit into the slot, so you have to use a smaller screwdriver. I just don’t understand why this particular battery is that way when all the others are normal.
You can, of course, charge the radio with USB-C, which it includes both the wall charger and USB cable for, which is unusual (who includes the USB wall charger anymore, don’t we have enough already?). Unfortunately, there is no drop-in charger included. I tried my UV-20 and UV-17l chargers, as they both use the same basic style of screw on battery, but of course it didn’t fit. If you want a desktop charger, that will be an additional $13 please, lol.
Performance:
The antenna that comes with the Baofeng UV-21 is remarkably good for a factory antenna. Not bad SWRs and good return loss for both 2m and 70cm. And here is where things get interesting. Most of the ads for both the UV-21 and UV-21R say dual-band, however I have seen a couple ads that start off saying tri-band in the title or top description, only to then say dual-band down below. Moreover, all the pictures I have seen in the ads show 2m and 70cm frequencies.
The reason I bring all this up is if you look at the antenna tests, there is clearly another peak in performance right next to the 1.25m band. As soon as I saw that, I grabbed my Baofeng UV-21 and tried to enter a 1.25m frequency in the VFO, you can’t.
Next up is power output, which is 3.4 watts out on 2m and 2 watts on 70cm. About typical for these type radios. The signal coming out shows to be reasonably well-defined and consistent in the spectrum analysis. Transmitted audio was good with no aberrations, nice and clear.
Images:
Radio Specifics:
| Screen readability | Good | |
| In-hand feel | Very Good | |
| Included antenna | Good | |
| Construction quality | Good | |
| Belt clip | Good | |
| Programmability | Good | |
| Transmit audio | CLICK TO LISTEN | |
| Frequency accuracy | 145.000 @ 145.000 | |
| Maximum power output 2m/70cm | 3.4 watts / 2 watts | |
| Actual weight | 300g | |
| Battery advertised mAh | ||
| Battery tested mAh | 1460mAh | |
| Radio manual | CLICK TO DOWNLOAD | |
| Programming software | CLICK TO DOWNLOAD | |
| Price based score 0-5 | 4 | |
| Overall score 0-10 | 3 |
Test Images:
If you are interested, click here for an article on how I test radios.
FEATURES:
- Dual-band
- 999 channels
- 50 CTSS and 210 DCS codes
- 1.77″ color LCD
- Dual-watch
- FM radio reception
- VOX function
- NOAA weather channels
- Wireless frequency copy
- CHIRP compatible
- LED flashlight
| PROS: | CONS: |
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Programming the radio can be done with the Baofeng software, or with CHIRP. As of this writing, there is no Baofeng UV-21 listed in CHIRP other than the UV-21 Pro GPS and UV-21 Pro, neither of which work. It does work, however, with the UV-17 option. Go figure. Of course it uses the same old Baofeng programming cable as almost every other Baofeng out there.
Conclusions
Do I recommend this radio? Sure. It provides a good, solid performing set of electronics housed in a comfortable exterior shell. It even comes with an antenna that isn’t complete trash. Would I recommend the Baofeng UV-21, UV-21R or UV-21 Pro? It’s a toss-up between the 21 and 21r as I am just not seeing a real difference, and I would stay away from the extra cost of the 21 Pro unless I really needed GPS in my car, in my phone, and in my radio.
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