The Cobra Floating All Terrain Radio (MRHH450) is one of the most thoughtfully-designed pieces of outdoor gear I’ve used in years. Built with serious attention to detail and packed with valuable features, this radio is a must-have item for anyone spending serious time in the backcountry or far away from shore.

I mention being away from shore because this Cobra All Terrain Radio is just that – all terrain. It utilizes both the GMRS and VHF bands for communication. So whether you’re in the middle of the Rockies or out on the Pacific chasing halibut, you won’t have to worry about getting help out of range.

Adding the fact that this radio floats, you have a piece of gear that’ll likely become integral to your outdoor experience.

But enough of an overview – let’s look deeper at the features packed into this radio.

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Build Quality

Cobra touts this radio as being all-terrain and is built with that sort of use in mind. All the parts are heavy-duty polymer-based, and even though you have to assemble the radio when pulling it out of the box, nothing feels like it’ll break easily or is cheaply made.

This is also where I’ll mention that the radio does float as well as advertised. I particularly enjoy that Cobra built a bright, hunter-orange back plate into this radio. That makes it easier to spot when you drop it in a river – not that I’d have any personal experience with that.

Another fantastic feature is what Cobra dubs “BURP” technology. The idea is that when water gets into the speakers, the radio will vibrate and shake the water out from the speaker grille. That’ll result in clearer audio and speaker performance if it works as intended.

After a decent soaking, I was surprised that the BURP feature worked as well as it did. Usually, those types of parts are just gimmicks, but not with Cobra.

Transmission Options

What’s evident when going through this radio is that Cobra paid attention to details. You’ll see that in the transmission options, among other places.

Since battery life is always a valuable resource – especially when you’re away from any charging source – you don’t need to broadcast on long-range, high-frequency channels. This Cobra radio allows you to toggle between multiple power levels on the VHF and GMRS bands.

In addition, you can easily toggle between VHF and GMRS bands. This way, you’re not using the battery power for VHF transmissions when you only need land-based communication via GMRS. Either band allows you to communicate long distances in an emergency quickly.

You’ll also find many privacy options on the GMRS side of things. The Cobra radio utilizes 15 channels and 121 privacy codes. That amounts to 1,815 privacy combination settings. If you must ensure you have radio waves to yourself, this should give you great peace of mind.

Finally, it’s worth noting that Cobra has built-in some advanced vibration features to help alert you of incoming transmissions.

S.A.M.E Weather Alerts

I’ve had radios that advertised weather alert features, but they were always for a highly generalized area. This Cobra radio utilizes Specific Area Message Encoding (S.A.M.E.), allowing you to set your specific area. This filters out weather alerts that might be region-wide but not location-focused. This is particularly helpful in the high country, where it’s normal to see thunderstorms in one basin and blue skies in the next one.

This is a feature I see many people, like hunters and anglers, utilizing. It’s always hard to know what the weather will do, and having access to localized forecasts and warnings when you’re miles away from a road can make all the difference in stalking that big bull elk or not getting stuck in a flash flood.

In addition to S.A.M.E., the Cobra radio has access to the standard NOAA weather channels. These channels are available 24 hours per day.

Rewind-Say-Again

This is a trademarked feature from Cobra; no review of their gear would be complete without it. This feature allows you to play back missed VHF and GMRS calls. So if you missed an essential transmission from a friend, another person in distress, or a weather alert, the radio will alert you to the missed call. You’ll then be able to play those back at a moment’s notice.

Wrapping Up

For the price, it’s hard to find something more feature-filled than the Cobra Floating All Terrain Radio. This radio is worth the price, from the Rewind-Say-Again feature to its complete waterproof casing. It’s a great piece of gear at a very reasonable price.