DX Century Club

The DX Century Club, or DXCC, is an amateur radio operating award earned by making contact with 100 or more geographic entities around the world.

The award is granted by (and a registered trademark of ) the American Radio Relay League. Radio amateurs worldwide are eligible to apply although applicants from the US, its possessions and Puerto Rico must be ARRL members. Proof of two way contacts, either in the form of QSL cards or via digital entry into Logbook of The World (LoTW), must be submitted to qualify. Each DXCC award certificate is dated and individually numbered.

As amateur radio grew, achievement awards for working several distant places were developed. As early as 1926 the International Amateur Radio Union started issuing the Worked All Continents certificate. In 1934 R/9 magazine began the Worked All Zones award. The ARRL started to examine the issue in 1932 and, after considerable work to determine what a "country" was, presented its criteria in 1935. The first DXCC certificates were awarded in 1937, but the system was suspended during World War II. A new start began when American amateurs returned to the air on November 15, 1945, and the program has continued since that time.

The basic certificate is awarded to those amateur radio operators who successfully complete and confirm amateur radio communications with land based amateur radio stations located in at least 100 different entities on the DXCC List.

Entities are often, but not always, countries. Each entity contains some definable political or geographical distinctiveness. For example, although Hawaii is not a separate country from the United States, it is a separate DXCC entity due to its distance from the rest of the US.