Low Power Radio Service (LPRS)

The LPRS is a private, one-way short-distance communication service providing auditory assistance to persons with disabilities, persons who require language translation, and persons in educational settings, health care assistance to the ill, law enforcement tracking services in cooperation with a law enforcement agency, and point-to-point network control communications for Automated Marine Telecommunications System (AMTS) coast stations. Two-way voice communications are prohibited.

You do not need an FCC license to use most LPRS transmitters. To operate an LPRS transmitter for AMTS purposes, however, you must hold an AMTS license. Otherwise, provided you are not a representative of a foreign government, you are authorized by 47 C.F.R. 95.1001, to operate an FCC type-accepted LPRS transmitter for voice, data, or tracking signals as follows:

• Auditory assistance communications (including, but not limited to, applications such as assistive listening devices, audio description for the blind, and simultaneous language translation) for persons who:
  • Have physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more of the major life activities of such individuals;
  • Require language translation; or
  • May otherwise benefit from auditory assistance communications in educational settings.
• Health care related communications for the ill;
• Law enforcement tracking signals (for homing or interrogation) including the tracking of persons or stolen goods under authority or agreement with a law enforcement agency (federal, state, or local) having jurisdiction in the area where the transmitters are placed; or
• AMTS point-to-point network control communications.

An LPRS transmitter may be operated within the territorial limits of the fifty United States, the District of Columbia, and the Caribbean and Pacific Insular areas ("U.S."). It may also be operated on or over any other area of the world, except within the territorial limits of areas where radio-communications are regulated by another agency of the U.S., or within the territorial limits of any foreign government. The transmitting antenna must not exceed 30.5 meters (100 feet) above ground level. This height limitation does not apply, however, to LPRS transmitter units located indoors or where the antenna is an integral part of the unit.