The radio spectrum is divded into several "
bands" which were, to the best of my knowledge, defined at an international conference on radio communication in
1959.
The bands, and their uses as best I know are as follows:
Frequency Nomenclature Uses
10 - 30 kHz Very low frequency (VLF) ?
30 - 300 kHz Low frequency (LF) ?
300 - 3000 kHz Medium frequency (MF) Commercial AM radio
3 - 30 MHz High frequency (HF) shortwave radio, citizen band radio, some amateur radio (ham) operations
30 - 300 MHz Very high frequency (VHF) commercial FM radio, commercial broadcast television,
marine VHF radio, some ham operations
300 - 3000 MHz Ultra high frequency (UHF) commercial TV (channel 14 and up), cellular phones,
analog cordless phones (900 MHz), two-way radios (government/civil)
3 - 30 GHz Super high frequency (SHF) SETI, Experimental
30 - 300 GHz Extremely high frequency (EHF) Experimental
300 - 3000 GHz Tremendously high frequency (THF) Experimental
Some bands, especially
HF,
VHF, and
UHF, are divided into sub-bands, as there are many different uses that those bands are reserved for.
If anyone knows exactly what SHF and EHF are used for, I'd be interested to know. The THF one is not listed in the encyclopedia I gleaned this chart from, so I assume it was recognized after the 1959 conference. Likewise, the uses are from my own research and anyone wishing to correct a mistake I might have made, or alert me to an application I might have missed for any specific band, feel free to /msg me.
Thanks to panamaus, who pointed out the cellular, analog, and two-way in UHF.