The Morse Code Alphabet
Every character of international Morse code, each one playable on its own. Press a character to hear the rhythm rather than read the dots.
The Morse code alphabet assigns each letter a sequence of short and long signals, called dots and dashes. E is a single dot and T a single dash because they are the most common letters in English; rare letters like Q and Y get four signals. The whole system has just two symbols, and everything else comes from how long each one lasts and how far apart they sit. The international version has been in use since 1865 and covers 26 letters, ten digits and the common punctuation marks.
Letters A to Z
- A .-
- B -...
- C -.-.
- D -..
- E .
- F ..-.
- G --.
- H ....
- I ..
- J .---
- K -.-
- L .-..
- M --
- N -.
- O ---
- P .--.
- Q --.-
- R .-.
- S ...
- T -
- U ..-
- V ...-
- W .--
- X -..-
- Y -.--
- Z --..
One letter at a time
Each letter has a page of its own with the sound, how long it lasts at three speeds, which letters sit one element away from it, and what it looked like in American Morse:
Numbers 0 to 9
The digits are the tidiest part of the whole code. Each one is five signals long, and they run in a straight sequence: 1 starts with one dot and fills up with dashes, 5 is five dots, and from 6 onwards the dashes come back from the front.
- 0 -----
- 1 .----
- 2 ..---
- 3 ...--
- 4 ....-
- 5 .....
- 6 -....
- 7 --...
- 8 ---..
- 9 ----.
Punctuation
Punctuation runs to five or six signals, which is why operators avoid it on the air and write out stop instead of a full stop. The at sign is the newest addition: the ITU adopted it in 2004, built from A and C run together, for sending email addresses.
- . .-.-.-
- , --..--
- ? ..--..
- ' .----.
- ! -.-.--
- / -..-.
- ( -.--.
- ) -.--.-
- & .-...
- : ---...
- ; -.-.-.
- = -...-
- + .-.-.
- - -....-
- _ ..--.-
- " .-..-.
- $ ...-..-
- @ .--.-.
Accented letters
These are not part of the international standard but grew up in national practice, which is why some of them collide. Å and À share the same signal, as do Ö and Ø. If you decode one of those, context decides which letter was meant.
- Ä .-.-
- Å .--.-
- À .--.-
- É ..-..
- È .-..-
- Ö ---.
- Ø ---.
- Ü ..--
- Ñ --.--
- Ç -.-..
- ß ...--..
- CH ----
Prosigns
Prosigns are procedural signals. They are sent as one unbroken run with no letter gaps, which is exactly what makes them stand out from ordinary text. SOS is the famous one; AR ends a message, SK ends a contact, and eight dots in a row mean the operator made a mistake and is starting the word again.
- SOS ...---...
- AR .-.-.
- SK ...-.-
- BT -...-
- KN -.--.
- AS .-...
- HH ........
Why E is one dot and Q is four signals
The code is not arbitrary. When Alfred Vail worked out the assignments in the 1840s for Samuel Morse's electrical telegraph, he counted the letters in the type cases of a local newspaper office: the more type a printer kept of a letter, the more often that letter must occur. The most common letters got the shortest signals. That single decision is why Morse code is still efficient nearly two centuries later.
The version in the table above is not the original. American Morse code used pauses inside some characters and dashes of two different lengths, which worked on a landline sounder and not much else. Friedrich Clemens Gerke reworked it in 1848 to remove those irregularities; his version became the standard of the German-Austrian Telegraph Union in 1851 and the international standard in 1865. It is maintained today by the International Telecommunication Union as ITU-R M.1677-1, which is why the same table works in amateur radio, in aviation and at sea.
How to actually learn it
Reading this page will not teach you Morse code, and that is not a failing of the page. A printed table teaches your eyes, and Morse arrives through your ears. Everyone who learns from a chart hits the same wall: they hear dot dot dot, picture three dots, then look up S. That detour caps you at around 10 words per minute and it never gets faster.
The way out is to learn each letter as one sound from the start:
- Play a character on this page instead of reading it. Say the whole letter, not the dots.
- Keep the character speed at 18 to 20 WPM even on day one, and give yourself time by stretching the gaps instead. That is Farnsworth timing, and the translator on the front page does it for you.
- Start with a handful of letters, not the whole alphabet. K and M first, then add one at a time as each becomes automatic. That is the Koch method, and it is the fastest route anyone has found.
- Five focused minutes daily beats an hour on Sunday. This is muscle memory, not knowledge.
Frequently asked questions
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How many characters does the Morse code alphabet have?
The international standard covers 26 letters, 10 digits and 18 punctuation marks. On top of that come 12 accented letters from national practice and 7 prosigns, which brings the full table on this page to 73 characters.
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Is there a difference between upper and lower case?
No. Morse code has no capitals. A and a are the same signal, so anything you decode comes back in one case and the original capitalisation is lost.
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What is the shortest and the longest character?
The shortest are E as a single dot and T as a single dash. Among the everyday characters the longest are the digits at five signals each, while punctuation such as the dollar sign runs to seven.
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Why do some accented letters share a code?
Because they were never part of one agreed standard. Different countries added the letters they needed, and nobody coordinated it. Å and À both ended up as
.--.-, and Ö and Ø both as---.. In practice the language of the message tells you which was meant. -
How long does it take to learn the Morse code alphabet?
Recognising all 26 letters by ear takes most people four to eight weeks at five to fifteen minutes a day. Reading them off a chart takes an afternoon and is worth much less: the chart teaches your eyes, and Morse arrives through your ears. Getting from recognition to a usable speed of around 20 WPM is the longer half, and it is mostly a question of how regularly you practise rather than how long each session lasts.
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Is the Morse code alphabet still used today?
Yes, in narrower places than before. Amateur radio operators use it daily, where it is called CW; aviation still identifies navigation beacons by their Morse call sign; and it remains the fallback whenever a signal has to get through conditions that defeat voice. What ended in 1999 was its role in commercial maritime traffic, not the code itself.
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Can I print this alphabet?
Yes. The print view drops the navigation and the tools and lays the characters out in columns that fit on one sheet.