How to Get a Radio Licence in Australia: Apparatus, Spectrum and Class Licences Explained
To operate most transmitters legally in Australia, you need authorisation from the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). Depending on the service, that authorisation comes through one of three licence types:
a class licence
an apparatus licence
a spectrum licence
This guide explains how to work out which one applies to you, and how to obtain it.
The Short Answer
The licence you need is decided by a short chain of questions.
If a class licence already covers your equipment, you need no individual licence and pay no fee. You simply operate within its conditions.
If not, you need an apparatus licence for your specific stations. The key question then is whether it is assigned, meaning it needs a coordinated frequency and so involves an accredited person, or non-assigned, meaning you apply to the ACMA directly.
A spectrum licence is the third type, but it is allocated to carriers and large operators through auction, so it rarely applies to a site operator.
Work through those questions and the rest is a sequence of well-defined steps.
The Three Licence Types at a Glance
The differences between the three types drive everything that follows, so it helps to see them side by side.
Before the detail, here is the whole path in a single view. Most licensing questions resolve somewhere on this flow.
Almost every radio licensing question in Australia resolves on this flow. A class licence needs no application at all. An apparatus licence splits on one question: whether the frequency has to be coordinated, which is what decides if an accredited person is involved.
Step 1: Check Whether You Need a Licence at All
The cheapest licence is the one you do not have to apply for. Before starting any application, check whether a class licence already authorises your equipment. If it does, there is nothing to lodge and nothing to pay.
The best known example is the Low Interference Potential Devices (LIPD) Class Licence. It underpins Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, most IoT and telemetry devices, keyless entry, and a wide range of short-range industrial equipment. If your device operates within the LIPD conditions on power, bandwidth and band, you are licensed the moment you comply. The detail of the current instrument is set out in the 2025 LIPD Class Licence explainer.
UHF Citizen Band (CB) radio is class licensed too, and since 19 February 2024 so is amateur radio. The Radiocommunications (Amateur Stations) Class Licence 2023 moved everyday amateur operation onto a class licence, so a foundation, standard or advanced operator no longer holds a personal apparatus licence to get on air. A qualification is still required, and an amateur repeater or beacon still needs an assigned apparatus licence, but routine operation is now class authorised.
The trade-off of the class model is the same in every case. You accept interference and you must not cause it beyond the permitted limits. There is no protected frequency to fall back on. So if your application is a mission-critical network that has to be defensible against interference, a class licence is not the right instrument, and you move to Step 2.
Key takeaway: If a class licence covers your equipment, you are done. There is no form and no fee, only the obligation to stay within the conditions.
Step 2: Identify the Right Apparatus Licence Type
If no class licence covers you, the service needs an apparatus licence. The ACMA offers a range of types matched to what the equipment is for, and the type you choose sets the application form, the technical conditions, and the fee.
The categories most relevant to systems integrators and network operators are these.
Apparatus licence type
Typical user
Coordination required?
Annual fee?
Land mobile
Two-way radio fleets in mining, utilities, transport and security
Yes, assigned
Yes
Fixed
Point-to-point and point-to-area links, including microwave backhaul
Yes, assigned
Yes
Point to point
Fixed links up to 200 W EIRP in regional and remote areas, 5.725 to 5.825 GHz
Yes
Yes
Broadcasting transmitter
Radio and television broadcasters
Yes
Yes
Maritime ship and aircraft
Vessels and aircraft stations
No, non-assigned
Yes
Scientific
Test, measurement and research transmitters
Varies
Yes
Amateur (assigned)
Repeaters and beacons, which remain individually licensed
Yes
Yes
If you are unsure which one applies, the ACMA publishes a Find out what licence you need guide that steps through equipment and purpose. It is the right place to confirm the category before you go any further.
Step 3: Assigned or Non-Assigned, the Fork That Decides Everything
This is the single most important step. It determines whether you can lodge the application yourself, or whether you first need an engineer to coordinate a frequency.
An assigned licence authorises operation on a specific frequency that has been checked against the services already operating around your site. Because that frequency has to be found and coordinated, you cannot simply pick one. To apply for an assigned licence, you contact an accredited person, who does the frequency assignment and interference assessment. Most land mobile and fixed licences are assigned, precisely because their value is a protected, coordinated frequency.
A non-assigned licence operates under pre-coordinated or shared arrangements, so there is no individual frequency to assign. For these, you can apply to the ACMA directly, with no coordination step. Ship and aircraft station licences are common examples.
So the fork is simple to state. Assigned means an accredited person is involved before the ACMA is. Non-assigned means you go straight to the ACMA.
Key takeaway: Assigned licences need a coordinated frequency and an accredited person. Non-assigned licences you can lodge yourself.
Step 4: Coordinate the Frequency (Assigned Licences Only)
For an assigned licence, the work that makes the whole thing possible is the frequency coordination, and it can only be certified by a particular kind of engineer.
An accredited person is an individual the ACMA has authorised under Part 5.4 of the Radiocommunications Act 1992 to issue a frequency assignment certificate. That certificate is a signed statement, made on reasonable grounds, that a specific transmission at a specific place and frequency will sit lawfully alongside everything already there.
The coordination behind it draws on the Register of Radiocommunications Licences, which the ACMA updates daily. That way the assignment is checked against current services rather than stale data.
It is worth being clear about what the certificate does and does not do. It supports your application, but it does not issue your licence, and it does not bind the regulator. The ACMA may have regard to the certificate when it decides whether to grant the licence, and the licensing decision stays with the ACMA. The full detail of what an accredited person can certify is covered in What an ACMA accredited person can certify.
You can carry out the technical groundwork yourself before engaging an accredited person. Our frequency coordination tool checks a candidate assignment against surrounding services, the ACMA spectrum map shows what is already licensed nearby, and for microwave paths the link planner confirms whether the hop closes before anyone commits to a channel.
Step 5: Lodge the Application and Pay the Fees
With the licence type settled, and a frequency assignment certificate in hand for an assigned licence, the application goes to the ACMA. You choose the licence on the ACMA site, download the application form for that type, and lodge it, attaching the certificate where one is required.
An apparatus licence fee is not a single number. It is built from separate components, and it helps to know what they are.
Fee component
What it recovers
Administrative charge
The direct cost of spectrum management, such as issuing the licence
Annual apparatus licence tax
The indirect cost of spectrum management, and an incentive to use spectrum efficiently
Commercial broadcasting tax
Applies only to transmitters carrying a commercial broadcast service
The annual licence tax is the part that varies most. The ACMA charges a transmitter licence tax, and a receiver licence tax where a receiver is licensed. The amount depends on the licence type and on the population density of the area in which you operate.
A licence in a dense metropolitan area costs more than the same licence in a remote one, which reflects how contested the spectrum is. As at mid 2026 the minimum tax for a spectrum access or non-assigned licence sits around $42.88, and the ACMA updates these rates periodically by reference to population change.
Because the tax depends on band, area and licence type, the reliable way to price a specific application is to calculate it rather than estimate it. Our ACMA fee calculator works the figure out from the current schedule, and the ACMA publishes its own calculator alongside it.
On duration, most apparatus licences are issued for one year. The ACMA can issue a licence for up to 20 years, and reviews requests for longer terms on an individual basis, but the annual licence is the default you should plan around.
Key takeaway: There is no flat price. Budget from the annual licence tax for your band and area, then add the administrative charge.
Step 6: Operate, Renew and Keep the Licence Current
Once the licence is issued, you may operate the station within the parameters on it, and only within them. The licence pins down the frequency, the location, the maximum power and often the antenna height and pattern. Those parameters are conditions, not suggestions.
Two obligations follow. The first is renewal. Because most licences run for a year, they have to be renewed and the annual tax paid to keep the authorisation live.
The second is change control. If you move the antenna, raise the power, add a site or change the frequency, you are altering the very things the coordination was based on. A material change sends you back through assignment and re-coordination before you operate on the new parameters. A licence protects you only for as long as your operation matches it.
Where Spectrum Licences Fit
For completeness, the third type sits above the other two. A spectrum licence authorises the use of a defined block of frequency over a defined geographic area, and lets the holder deploy and manage their own stations within that block.
Spectrum licences are allocated through auction or another price based process rather than issued on application. That is why they are the framework behind mobile carrier networks and similar large-scale commercial allocations, rather than something a typical site operator applies for. If your work sits outside the carrier world, the apparatus and class decision is the one that matters day to day.
A Worked Example: A Regional Mine’s UHF Land Mobile Network
Suppose a mine in regional Queensland needs a UHF two-way network: base stations at the office and the workshop, a repeater on a nearby hill to cover the pit, and mobiles in the haul trucks and light vehicles. The path to a licence runs like this.
Rule out a class licence. The network has to be reliable and defensible across a busy site, so a shared class-licensed band is the wrong model. The service needs apparatus licensing.
Choose the type. Base stations, mobiles and portables on assigned channels are a land mobile service, and the repeater is part of the same land mobile picture.
Confirm it is assigned. Land mobile channels are coordinated, so this is an assigned licence, which means an accredited person is needed before the ACMA is.
Coordinate the frequency. The accredited person pulls the licensed services around the mine from the Register of Radiocommunications Licences, finds channels that clear coordination for the base, repeater and mobiles, assesses interference in both directions, and issues a frequency assignment certificate.
Lodge and pay. The application goes to the ACMA with the certificate attached. Because the mine is in a low density area, the annual tax is toward the lower end of the schedule, and the fee calculator gives the exact figure across the channels.
Operate and maintain. The mine operates within the licensed parameters, renews annually, and returns for re-coordination if it later adds a site or extends coverage.
The same six steps scale up or down. A single point-to-point microwave hop follows the identical path, with the fixed or point to point licence type in place of land mobile.
Common Mistakes Worth Avoiding
A few errors show up again and again, and each one is cheaper to avoid than to unwind.
Assuming a class licence gives you protection. It does not. Build a mission-critical service on a shared band and you have no regulatory recourse when a compliant device degrades your link, because the band is shared by design.
Picking the frequency before coordination. On an assigned licence the channel comes out of coordination against existing services, not out of whatever the radio happens to support.
Forgetting that changes need re-coordination. Moving the antenna or raising the power changes the basis of the assignment, and puts you outside the licence until you re-coordinate.
Treating the fee as a fixed number. The annual tax depends on band, area and licence type, so an estimate carried over from another site is usually wrong.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need a licence for UHF radios?
It depends on the radio. UHF CB radios operating on the 40 or 80 channel CB band are covered by a class licence, so no individual licence is needed as long as the equipment is compliant. UHF two-way radios operating on assigned business or private channels are a different matter, and need a land mobile apparatus licence.
How much does an ACMA apparatus licence cost?
There is no single price. The cost is built from an administrative charge plus an annual licence tax that depends on the band, the licence type and the population density of the area. As at mid 2026 the minimum tax for a non-assigned or spectrum access licence sits around $42.88, but most licences cost more. The reliable way to get a figure is to use the ACMA fee calculator.
How long does an apparatus licence last?
Most apparatus licences are issued for one year and are renewed annually. The ACMA can issue a licence for up to 20 years and considers longer terms case by case, but you should plan around the annual licence.
Can I choose my own frequency?
Not for an assigned licence. The frequency comes out of coordination against the services already operating around your site, so it is assigned rather than chosen. Non-assigned licences use shared or pre-coordinated arrangements, so there is no individual frequency for you to select either.
Do I need an accredited person?
Only for assigned licences, which need a frequency assignment certificate from an accredited person. For a non-assigned licence you can apply to the ACMA directly, with no accredited person involved.
Before You Apply: A Quick Recap
Getting a radio licence in Australia is mostly a matter of working through the decision in the right order.
Check whether a class licence already covers your equipment.
If not, identify the correct apparatus licence type.
Determine whether the licence is assigned, and so whether frequency coordination is required.
Lodge the application with the ACMA, along with any supporting certificate.
Starting with the correct licence type avoids delays, unnecessary costs and interference problems later.
If you would rather not run that process yourself, noIM₃ handles it end to end. We provide ACMA apparatus licensing services through a General Licensing Accreditation, covering point-to-point links, point-to-area services, licensee and site registration. You can request a licensing service, price an application with our fee calculator, or handle the technical side yourself with our frequency coordination and link planning tools.
Fees, rates and the number of licence options are current as at July 2026 and change from time to time. Confirm the current position on the ACMA site before lodging an application.
An accredited person is an individual the ACMA has authorised under Part 5.4 of the Radiocommunications Act 1992 to issue certificates that support radiocommunications licensing. There are exactly two kinds of accreditation, and an accredited person does not issue your licence. This guide covers what accreditation is, the difference between a frequency assignment certificate and an interference impact certificate, the legal test a certificate has to satisfy, the obligations that sit behind the signature, and how to check that someone is genuinely accredited.
What the LIPD Class Licence is, how the 2025 refinements affect short-range and unlicensed devices, and the practical steps engineers should take to stay compliant.
What the Australian Communications and Media Authority actually does, the legislation it works under, and why its framework shapes almost every decision an RF engineer makes.
