General Radiotelephone licenses take a median of 2 days at the FCC
Receipt-to-grant times for commercial radio operator licenses, measured from FCC license data.
General Radiotelephone Operator License (GROL) licenses granted in the last 3 months were issued a median of 2 days after the FCC received the application, 8 days or more for the slowest tenth (371 licenses). Processing by the commercial examination manager (COLEM) before the FCC receives the application is not visible in the data.
GROL processing, in numbers
By license type
General Radiotelephone Operator License (GROL): median 2 days, middle half 2 to 6 days, slowest tenth 8 days or more (371 new licenses, last 3 months).
Marine Radio Operator Permit: median 2 days, middle half 1 to 4 days, slowest tenth 8 days or more (385 new licenses, last 3 months).
GMDSS Radio Operator: median 2 days, middle half 1 to 7 days, slowest tenth 8 days or more (63 new licenses, last 3 months).
Not enough recent grants to report: Restricted GMDSS Operator (1 in the last 3 months), GMDSS Radio Maintainer (17 in the last 3 months), GMDSS Operator/Maintainer (16 in the last 3 months). We report a license type only when it has at least 30 new grants in the window.
GROL trend
What this means for you
Once the FCC has your application, the grant takes the number of days shown above. The step before it, the commercial examination manager (COLEM) processing your exams and filing the application, is not visible in the FCC data, so ask your exam provider when they filed.
Still preparing for the written exams? The GROL needs Element 1 and Element 3; you can practice Element 3 here.
How we measure this
Source
Source: the FCC's Universal Licensing System public access files (the transaction and complete files the FCC publishes at data.fcc.gov). Names, addresses and other personal fields are discarded on arrival; we store and publish aggregates only.
What we measure
Days from the date the FCC receives the application to the grant date, for new commercial operator licenses, in rolling three-month windows by grant date. We report a license type only when it has at least 30 new grants in the window.
Completeness: 29,349 of 29,349 commercial grants in the last 12 months have both dates.
What we cannot measure
Processing by the commercial examination manager (COLEM) before the application reaches the FCC is not visible in the data.
Credit
For many years the amateur radio community relied on Joe Speroni (AH0A)'s FCC licensing statistics. Our counting uses the same public data and a comparable approach, and we credit his long-running work.
US ham radio statistics FAQ
How long does it take to get a GROL after passing the exams?+
The FCC stage takes a median of 2 days from receiving the application. The step before it, the exam manager filing your result, is not in public data.
What do the license codes mean?+
PG is the General Radiotelephone Operator License (GROL), MP the Marine Radio Operator Permit, DO the GMDSS Radio Operator license. The FCC data identifies each license by these operator class codes.