I have used these a few times now while camping. I have an autistic son who is is Boy Scouts and can get extremely over whelmed in new places. This has allowed me to give him more freedom since he is getting older with having to hover over him. He feels safe knowing I am just a push of the button away from him. The water proof aspect also works well for us since he is still a young boy that is rough on everything.

I have owned these for about a year now. My wife and I use them on our jet skis where they regularly get wet and have submerged on occasion in salt water. All things considered, they have held up well, but they are definitely degrading. Audio quality is not as good as it was and at long ranges (beyond visual) you cant make out anything, but if they're relatively close, (within a half mile) the quality is still intelligible. Also if they get wet, the light will blink and it cannot be turned off, which is at times annoying, though the buoyancy has kept us from loosing them a couple times. They've also started having trouble charging, where the charger pins wont make good contact.Overall I would recommend them, as they have served well, but if I had to replace them I may see about other options.

Great radios, I love the battery pack or disposable battery option

Radios work great and are waterproof but as soon as they get wet it automatically triggers the flashing light. The light won't shut off which quickly kills the battery. If not for this feature I'd rate a 5/5.*** updated review after using for roughly a month on and off with volume maxed out you can hardly hear any transaction coming from either radio. Would not recommend if they are to be used in conditions where they may get wet.

Over the summer my family did a lot of boating and swimming by the lake and wanted to be able to communicate between everyone out on the lake and people back at the shore. Since accidents happen, especially with kids, we wanted waterproof radios that floated. These did the trick: with the factory-installed batteries (I didn't try any others), they'd float to the surface in a freshwater lake and would function without any leaks or issues. Even with extensive submergence and being tied to a rope and dragged behind a kayak for an hour or so, there were no leaks. As a handy feature, whenever the radio is immersed in water the white flashlight lamp flashes on and off to aid in locating it even in the dark.Charging is simple: just plop them into the provided dock that you can plug into any USB power supply. Minor nitpick: the battery indicator on the radios constantly shows the "charging" animation whenever they're charging on the dock, even when the batteries are fully charged, so there's no way of knowing how full they actually are.They easily had a range of more than 4400 feet (>0.8 miles) over the lake's surface, even with one of the radios inside a house, when the radios were set to 2W of power. At that range, there was virtually no static and voices came through crystal clear. I didn't test them at 0.5 W.The user interface is simple and easy to navigate with the on-screen menu being easy to navigate. Some of the settings may not be intuitively clear as to what they do, but the manual explains them.The radios work on standard FRS frequencies and are completely compatible with other FRS radios. They support CTCSS tone and DCS code squelch (often misleading called "privacy codes", as they don't offer privacy, but allow you to only hear transmissions from others using the same tone/code), and if you set the radio to use the same channel and tone/code combination (or set the tone/code to "0" to turn it off entirely) they interoperate with any other FRS-standard radio. The tones/codes are selected from the list ranging from 0 to 121, but the manual does not specify which actual tones/codes (e.g. 127.3 Hz, or DCS223) correspond to those numeric values. After contacting Retevis and a few emails back and forth where I tried to explain exactly what I wanted to know (evidently there was some minor misunderstandings, but politeness and persistence paid off), they sent me a table showing which tones/codes match each numeric value. It turns out they use the "Common" values used by Motorola, Uniden, and many other manufacturers. You can find a table listing the Common values and what they correspond to on radios by other manufacturers by searching for "FRS/GMRS Privacy Codes Demystified".The radios are a bit bulky (since they need the extra bulk to be able to float) but my 6 and 9 year old kids were able to hold and use them with zero issues.The radios are also capable of receiving NOAA weather radio signals, which was handy, but a bit of a niche feature. They can be set to automatically switch to the weather radio signal when an alert is issued, but they don't allow one to set SAME codes or locations, so if you set them to use the weather alert then any time they receive any alert (even for one outside of your region) they'll switch to the weather radio.I tested but did not use the "SOS alarm" feature (which sounds a loud alarm, flashes a red light that is not otherwise able to be turned on, and transmits the alarm signal over the radio). The built-in white flashlight is basic and not terribly bright, but is handy if you already have the radio in-hand and don't want to fumble around for a proper flashlight.In short: for license-free FRS use where contact with or submersion in water is a possibility, these are great. I recommend them.