I work under the assumption that first, all antennas (both stock and aftermarket) for portable scanners and portable handheld amateur transceivers are a compromise. The lengths of wire they coil up inside the things are cut to (usually the center frequency) for the band they were designed for and multi band antennas simply “tap” that coil of wire where it is resonant for the additional bands. Ideally, an antenna should be the length of a full wave (or my ltiples thereof) for the frequency but that’s impractible. So they shorten the lengths by using lengths for half wave, quarter wave, 5/8ths wave, etc. that makes the antennas manageable for portable applications. The amateur antennas may use a larger gauge of wire to support the need for transmitting but the lengths of wire used are the same. (Transmitters generate heat and because these antennas are basically dummy loads, they need to be able to dissipate this heat-or the wire would melt. It’s not a problem with scanners however as they are strictly a receiver-they don’t transmit.
I have used many stubby’s on my portable scanners and find they all perform about the same. And if you don’t have a reception problem, all of what you listen to is “Dead Full Quieting” (DFQ), go for it. Buy one of the well known recommended ones you see posted here and go with it. Don’t bother wondering if another stubby will do better unless you find your reception suffers on the strong local signals. I doubt that you will. Because, if it does, another stubby won’t do much better. Instead, look for an antenna that uses a different, longer length of wire they coil up... meaning the specs of the antenna will tout a 5/8ths wave instead of a quarter wave for example. It will be a longer antenna as there needs to be more windings on the coil to increase its length but reception should improve.
Disclaimer; I know this is a basic, simplistic look at stubbys but it suffices when choosing an aftermarket antenna, stubby or otherwise.
