I need an effective dog shock collar. Recommendations?

Sport dog are really solid but pricey. I got the highest rated one on chewy (I’m not field training a dog, just need to get his attention when his lab brain wonders) and it’s plenty for my needs and was like 40 bucks instead of 150.

I've been very happy with the Educator but I think it's $200-ish. If you're someone who always owns a dog or two it's worth it. There's a Tom Davis dog trainer on YT that endorses a collar brand, I've watched enough of his content to say that's probably a safe bet as well.

SportDog been great to me for many years, very durable.

E-collar training a dog isn't just slapping a collar on the dog and shocking it. The dog has to understand what it's getting corrected for. Use the collar to reinforce a command - not teach it.

Your budget really dictates the collar. I used SportDog for years but the new SportDogs are garbage. Super inconsistent and the remotes fail a lot. Their launcher/winger equipment is the same. I would look at Garmin or Dogtra. If you're not concerned with consistency/on a budget, just go get a cheap SportDog from Tractor Supply.

That’s the same one I got that was top rated on Chewy.

Definitely. I was a little unclear on OP, but if the dog knows "here," "come," or whatever the recall command is and disobeys for whatever reason, then the e-collar is used to reinforce that command.

Collar conditioning is the process of introducing the dog to the stimulation to teach them that the stimulation is a correction. Believe it or not, some dogs just don't get that right out of the gate. They get shocked and they freak out/get confused/don't understand. Disclaimer: this is somewhat nuanced dog training and may be more than OP is interested in getting into. Not saying OP absolutely has to go this route, but it is the best way to train the dog to understand the collar.

An easy way to do it is to take a command the dog knows well, like "sit." At the lowest level the dog can feel (can be determined by watching for any reaction, like an eye, ear, or slight flinch), apply continuous stimulation and give the sit command simultaneously. The second the dog's butt hits the ground, stop stimulation, praise and reward. Do this once a day for a few days with 10-15 reps per session, but don't apply stimulation every single time. Maybe every other time. It's a baseline way to (1) teach a dog to be comfortable with pressure and (2) teach the dog how to turn off pressure, which is ultimately the goal of using an e-collar. Once the dog gets comfortable with the collar on sit, expand to other commands like recall, and switch from continuous stimulation to momentary (a nick). At that point, the process becomes "sit," and if the dog hesitates at all, it gets nicked and the command reinforced. Same with here, down, heel, etc.

Conditioning also a good way to determine the dog's working level of stimulation. Some dogs are much higher than others. My current dog operates on a low 2 on her collar, and if I hit her with a low 3, she yips. This is also the importance of getting a good, consistent collar. You want a 2 to be a 2 every time you hit the button. SportDog has had issues recently with inconsistent stimulation.

I tried a cheap one from Amazon and wasn't happy with it. Finally gave in to spend the extra on SportDog and it's been amazing. "pricey but worth it" fits the bill exactly