How do I translate text into Morse code?

Type or paste your text in the left box and the Morse code appears on the right as you type. Letters are separated by a space and words by a slash, which is the most common way to write Morse in text. You can then copy it, download it as a .txt file, or press Play to hear it.

How do I decode Morse code back into text?

Paste the Morse code into the box. The translator recognises it automatically and switches to decoding, so you do not need to change any setting. It accepts the variations people actually paste: dots written as periods, asterisks or bullets, dashes written as hyphens, underscores or em dashes, and words separated by a slash, a pipe or a run of spaces.

What is SOS in Morse code?

SOS is three dots, three dashes, three dots: ... --- ... It was chosen in 1906 precisely because that pattern is unmistakable and easy to send under pressure, not because it stands for anything. It is sent as one continuous sequence with no gaps between the letters, which is why it is written ...---... rather than as three separate letters.

Can I hear the Morse code as sound?

Yes. Press Play and the code is generated as a real audio tone at 600 Hz, the frequency typical of amateur radio. You can set the speed from 5 to 25 words per minute. The timing follows the standard: a dash lasts three times a dot, the gap between letters is three dots long, and between words is seven.

What does WPM mean in Morse code?

Words per minute, measured with the standard word PARIS, which takes exactly 50 time units to send. At 20 WPM one dot lasts 60 milliseconds. Beginners usually start around 5 WPM; 13 WPM was the old amateur radio licensing requirement, and experienced operators work comfortably above 20.

Does Morse code have lowercase letters?

No. Morse makes no distinction between uppercase and lowercase, so anything you type is treated as uppercase. When decoding back to text the result comes out in uppercase for the same reason.

Is my text sent to a server?

No. The translation, the audio and everything else happen inside your browser using standard web APIs. Nothing you type is uploaded, logged or stored anywhere.

Morse Code Translator

Convert text to Morse code and Morse code back to text, then hear it played at real transmission speed. Paste Morse and the direction switches on its own. Everything runs in your browser — nothing is uploaded.

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Morse code

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How Morse code works

Morse code encodes letters as sequences of short and long signals — dots and dashes, or dits and dahs to the people who actually send it. Samuel Morse and Alfred Vail built the original version in the 1830s for telegraph lines; the version used today is International Morse code, standardised as ITU-R M.1677-1, which added accented letters and settled the punctuation.

The clever part is that the code is weighted by frequency. E, the most common letter in English, is a single dot. T is a single dash. Rare letters like Q and Z take four symbols. That is a hand-built version of the same idea behind modern compression: give the common things the short codes.

The timing is the code

Morse is not just about which symbols you send but how long you hold them. Everything is measured in units of one dot:

A dot is 1 unit; a dash is 3 units.
The gap between symbols inside a letter is 1 unit.
The gap between letters is 3 units.
The gap between words is 7 units.

Speed is quoted in words per minute using PARIS as the reference word, which takes exactly 50 units to send. At 20 WPM a single dot lasts 60 milliseconds. The playback here follows those ratios exactly, so what you hear is what a real operator would send.

Where it is still used

Morse stopped being required for maritime distress calls in 1999 and for most amateur radio licences in the 2000s, but it did not disappear. Amateur radio operators still use it because a Morse signal punches through noise that would swallow a voice transmission, and it needs almost no power or bandwidth. Aviation navigation beacons identify themselves in Morse to this day. It also turns up as an accessibility input method, and in puzzles, games and escape rooms.

Reading the output

This translator separates letters with a space and words with a slash, the convention used by most references and the easiest to read back. When decoding, it is deliberately forgiving: bullets and asterisks are treated as dots, underscores and em dashes as dashes, and pipes or long runs of spaces as word breaks — because that is how Morse actually arrives when copied from a forum post or a puzzle.

Need the full reference? The Morse code alphabet chart lists every letter, digit, punctuation mark and prosign, each one playable on its own.

Frequently asked questions

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