Hytera PD365 Review
I own quite a few DMR radios now and they are all of the larger style design, but I found that if I am using the radio in close proximity to my DMR Hotspot I didn’t want to have to keep carrying around a larger radio, sometimes it’s nice to be able to carry something smaller like a mobile phone. This is where the Hytera PD365 UHF DMR & FM UHF handheld transceiver comes in! This radio has a built in antenna and is very small (106 x 54 x 23mm) and weighs only 160g and has a removable 2000Mah battery. I found one quite cheaply on a facebook group, I think the previous owner was having some issues programming the radio and wanted to pass it on, I am used to programming DMR radios so thought i would buy the radio and see if it would fit my needs..
The radio came a couple of days later and my first impressions of the radio were how well built it was! This is my first Hytera radio and I have always wanted one as I knew they were of the more premium end of DMR radio. Usually well outside my price range but on this occasion it wasn’t.
Looking around the outside of the Hytera PD365 we have a large metal speaker grill at the top with two small microphone holes in the bottom right corner with the word MIC written above the holes, also we have the Hytera branding at the top this is etched into the radio and looks very premium. Below the speaker we have the display, this is on the small side but is quite a nice display and has a beautiful white backlight . The keypad is also small but is really nice to use, has a really premium feel like the rest of the radio the keypad also has a four way rocker switch for navigating through the menus and changing volume etc, there is also the words “Digital portable radio” engraved underneath the keypad. On the right side of the radio you have a micro USB charging port and a 2.5mm accessory port, having micro USB charging is one of my favorite features of 
this radio as its easily recharged from a battery bank or standard mobile phone charger. The accessory port is the only one on the radio so your choices of headsets and earpieces are slightly limited. On the left side we have two rubber buttons, the one at the top is the PTT button and has a beautiful orange accent around the outside of it, the lower button is a user programmable button. The top of the radio has an indent for the detachable belt clip to fix too and a small LED showing green on receive and red on transmit. Also on the top is a hole for the lanyard to fit through on the build in antenna.
The radio came very well packaged and seemed to have been well looked after, It came fully boxed with all the standard accessories intact.
The radio comes with:
1 x Manual
1 x 2000Mah Battery
1 x Belt clip
1 x Lanyard
OK let’s get acquainted with the radio.
This Hytera PD365 has just 256 channels (16 zones with 16 channels per zone) and has a three line monochrome display & is IP54 water a dust rated, there is no Bluetooth or GPS and does not have promiscuous mode. This is a very basic but well made DMR radio.
This radio has a very basic menu system but is nicely laid out, let’s take a look.
the menus are
Contact > message > call logs > scan > Zone > settings
I also purchased a cheap earpiece so that I can wear the radio around my neck on its lanyard and have the earpiece in my ear. This works well around close proximity to the hotspot.
This DMR radio is UHF only so it is limited and unlike the Tytera MD380 it has no number pad so you are unable to manually dial reflectors or talk groups, this is far from ideal. This means that you have to be heavily reliant on the programming of the radio via a computer and you have to know what UHF repeater or talk groups you want to operate on before hand as this cannot be changing in the field. This is one of the main downsides with this radio, yes its very compact but not being able to manually dial or send text messages that have not been pre-programmed could be an issue, and without the Paid for software cable (around £20) you won’t get very far! I also found it extremely hard to get hold of the computer programming software (cps).
But one of the main issues I have with this radio is how poorly it performs, you have to literally be sitting on top of your hotspot or repeater to get a low bit error rate, even at 10ft away I get issues! For listening around the house it works slightly better, I can walk around most of my small home without reception dropouts but as far as 
transmitting this radio is useless to be totally honest with you.
Conclusion.
This radio is a very nicely built DMR & FM UHF handheld transceiver, it has a really nice speaker that is among the best I’ve heard, if you have seen my review on the Ailunce HD1 the speaker on that radio is about the same as this but in absolutely every other aspect the Ailunce is by far the best of the two. The lack of VHF stacked with the very poor performance and the inability to manually dial on the fly makes this radio very hard to recommend. If you like to mostly listen to your hotspot that is very close by then this is a fair choice, but to be honest I’m sure there are a lot better options out there.
Thanks very much for reading my review of the Hytera PD365 DMR & FM UHF handheld transceiver, I really hope it helps you make an informed decision on your next ham radio purchase. Please also check out my other reviews.
Here are some more photo’s of the radio: