The single deciding question
Do your people work within one site, or beyond it? Within: a conventional walkie talkie — licence-free or licensed — costs nothing monthly and depends on nothing external. Beyond: no conventional handset connects Croydon to Coventry, and a network radio does it as casually as across a car park. Almost every real-world decision resolves right there.
Side by side
| Conventional walkie talkie | Network radio (PoC) | |
|---|---|---|
| Carries voice via | Its own radio waves, device to device | 4G/5G mobile networks + Wi-Fi |
| Range | 0.5–2 km typical; site-wide with licence/repeater | Unlimited within mobile coverage — UK-wide and beyond |
| Licence | None (PMR446) or £75/5 yrs (licensed) | None |
| Running cost | £0 | £8–£15 per radio per month |
| Works when networks fail | Yes — needs nothing external | No — no data, no voice |
| Extras | Voice (GPS etc. on high-end digital) | GPS tracking, lone-worker alarms, messaging, dispatch software as standard |
| Group size | Whoever's in range | Hundreds+, location-independent |
Where each wins, without hedging
Conventional wins
Single sites · zero-monthly-cost operations · anywhere mobile coverage is poor · comms that must survive a network outage. The direct radio link's independence is a genuine safety property no subscription replaces.
Network radio wins
Multi-site firms · couriers and drivers · security patrolling a town · events touring venues · any team that has ever said "you were out of range". Plus the management layer: live GPS, alarms, recorded traffic.
Costs over five years, ten radios
Conventional licence-free: ~£600 once. Conventional licensed: ~£3,000–£5,000 including handsets and licence. Network radio: ~£1,500–£2,500 in handsets plus ~£6,000 of subscriptions — £7,500–£8,500 total. The arithmetic favours conventional whenever conventional can physically do the job; the subscription only becomes good value at the moment range requirements leave the site boundary — and then it's the only game in town.
Digging deeper
Network radio is its own world — platforms, multi-network SIMs, handset ecosystems, industry deployments. The most thorough independent resource we know is pttovercellular.com, which covers how the networks actually work and a hardware roundup at useful depth. For the conventional side, start with PMR446 explained and the licensing upgrade decision.
Quick answers
What is a network radio?
A push-to-talk handset that carries voice over 4G/5G instead of its own frequency — unlimited range wherever there's signal, for a monthly SIM fee.
Is it better than a walkie talkie?
Beyond one site: decisively. Within one site: usually not — conventional is cheaper to run and independent of the networks. One question decides it.