Morse Code Words: Common Vocabulary, Prosigns and Abbreviations

Quick answer: Morse code has no separate symbol for a whole word — words are spelled out letter by letter, so HELP is .... . .-.. .--. and SOS is ... --- .... The part you cannot work out from the alphabet is the operating vocabulary: prosigns like AR and SK, which are sent as one continuous character, Q-codes like QTH and QRM, and CW abbreviations like 73 and 88. Those are covered in full below, along with how long each word actually takes to send.

Type or paste anything below to hear it as Morse. Reading dots on a screen teaches you very little; the rhythm is the thing you are actually learning.

How Words Are Built in Morse Code

Every character has its own pattern of dots and dashes. Words are formed by sending those patterns in sequence with a gap between each letter, exactly as you would spell the word out loud.

H is .... and I is .., so HI is .... .. — the two patterns with one letter gap between them.

There is no shorthand at the word level. SOS is not a symbol for distress; it is the letters S, O and S, chosen in 1906 because that particular sequence is unmistakable by ear and easy to send under stress.

The spacing rule, stated exactly

Spacing carries as much meaning as the dots and dashes. There are three gap lengths, measured in the same time units used for the elements themselves:

So the two-word phrase THANK YOU is written:

- .... .- -. -.- / -.-- --- ..-

The slash is a written convention only — on the air there is no slash sound, just a longer silence. Some references use a double space instead. This site uses the slash throughout because it survives copy and paste, which a double space does not.

Full timing details are on the Morse code timing rules page.

Common Morse Code Words, With Transmission Times

The table below gives each word’s code, its length in time units, and how long it takes to send at 20 words per minute. The time column matters more than it looks: it is the reason distress procedure uses SOS rather than the word EMERGENCY, which takes nearly three times as long.

Every code here was generated from the ITU standard character map and verified against it.

Which Words Are Fastest to Send

Word length in Morse has almost nothing to do with letter count. It depends on which letters you use, because E is one unit and Q is thirteen.

From the table above:

• Shortest: HI at 13 units — 0.8 seconds at 20 WPM
• SOS: 27 units — 1.6 seconds
• NO: 19 units, but YES is 25, because Y is -.--
• Longest here: AFFIRMATIVE at 91 units — 5.5 seconds, more than three times SOS

This is why operating vocabulary evolved the way it did. Under a weak signal every extra second is another second for the message to be lost, so procedure words are short by design. NEGATIVE is 57 units; sending NO instead costs 19. Over a long exchange that difference compounds.

To work out any word yourself: a dot is 1 unit, a dash is 3, the gap inside a letter is 1, and the gap between letters is 3. Add them up.

Prosigns: Letters Sent as One Character

This is the part of Morse vocabulary that cannot be derived from the alphabet chart, and the part most beginner guides get wrong.

A prosign is two or more letters run together with no gap between them, so they form a single new character. AR is not A followed by R. It is .-.-. sent as one unbroken pattern. Written with a gap, .- .-., it is just the letters AR and means nothing.

Prosigns are conventionally written with an overbar in print. Online they are usually shown in angle brackets — <AR>, <SK> — to signal that the letters are joined.

SOS is itself a prosign. It is sent as ...---... — nine elements with no letter gaps, one continuous character. Sent as three separate letters, ... --- ..., it is technically not the distress signal, though it will of course be understood. The run-together form is what makes it unmistakable through noise. More on this on the SOS in Morse code page.

K on its own — plain -.-, one letter — means “go ahead, anyone.” It is the open invitation that <KN> narrows to a single station.

Q-Codes: Three-Letter Shorthand

Q-codes are three-letter groups starting with Q, each standing for a full sentence. They were introduced by the British Post Office in 1909 and are sent as ordinary spelled letters, with normal gaps — unlike prosigns.

Each one works as both a statement and a question. Sent plainly, QTH states your location. Sent with a question mark, QTH? asks for the other station’s.

QRM and QRN are not the same thing, and mixing them up is the most common beginner error with Q-codes. QRM is interference from other transmitters — human-made. QRN is atmospheric noise — lightning, static, natural sources. Telling an operator you have QRM when you mean QRN sends them looking for a station that is not there.

QRS is worth knowing early. If someone is sending faster than you can copy, QRS? asks them to slow down, and any operator will. There is no embarrassment attached to it.

CW Abbreviations

Beyond Q-codes, operators use a set of contractions that developed from telegraph practice. These are spelled normally and simply save time.

73 and 88 are not interchangeable. They come from a numbered list of telegraph phrases used on American landline circuits in the 1850s, of which these two survived. Sending 88 to a stranger is a minor social error that operators will notice.

What a real exchange looks like

Putting the vocabulary together, a short contact runs roughly like this:

CQ CQ CQ DE W1ABC W1ABC K
W1ABC calls anyone listening and invites a reply.

W1ABC DE K2XYZ K
K2XYZ answers, naming who they are calling and identifying themselves.

K2XYZ DE W1ABC R TNX FB <BT> QTH BOSTON ES WX SUNNY <BT> 73 <SK>
Received, thanks, excellent. Location Boston and the weather is sunny. Best regards, end of contact.

Almost none of that is spelled-out English, which is the point. The vocabulary on this page is what actual Morse traffic consists of.

CQ, CQD and the Titanic

CQD was the first international distress call, adopted by the Marconi company on 1 February 1904. It is CQ — the general call to all stations — with a D appended for distress. In Morse: -.-. --.- -..

The popular expansion “Come Quick, Danger” is a backronym. It was invented after the fact and was never the official meaning. CQD is simply CQ plus D.

CQD was superseded quickly. The 1906 International Radiotelegraphic Convention in Berlin chose SOS instead, and it took effect on 1 July 1908. SOS won not because the letters stand for anything — they do not, and “Save Our Souls” is also a backronym — but because ...---... sent as one unbroken character is difficult to mishear and difficult to send wrong under pressure.

What Titanic actually sent

On the night of 14–15 April 1912, Titanic’s Marconi operators Jack Phillips and Harold Bride sent both. Titanic’s callsign was MGY — -- --. -.-- — so the traffic reads CQD DE MGY, meaning “distress call, from MGY.”

They began with CQD because that was still the habitual call among Marconi operators four years after SOS became standard. Bride is reported to have suggested switching to SOS partway through, on the grounds that it was the new call and might be the last chance to send it. Both went out that night.

This is why searches for CQD, MGY and SOS turn up together — the Titanic is the moment the two distress calls overlapped in the historical record.

The full account, including the surviving message texts, is on Titanic’s Morse code SOS messages explained.

How to Learn This Vocabulary

In the order that actually works:

1. Learn the alphabet by sound first. Not by looking at dots. If you memorize the visual patterns you will have to unlearn it later, because at 20 WPM there is no time to picture anything. Start with the Morse code alphabet.
2. Then the short words. HI, OK, NO, GO, SOS — anything under 30 units from the table above. They are short enough to hear as a single rhythm rather than a string of letters.
3. Then the prosigns. There are only eight in common use and they appear in every single contact, so the return on learning them is immediate.
4. Then the Q-codes you will actually hear. QTH, QRZ, QSL, QRS, QRM. The rest can wait.
5. Then abbreviations, as you meet them. These do not need drilling — you pick them up by listening.

Work on the Morse code machine for sending practice, or use the practice tools for receiving.

Where This Vocabulary Is Still Used

Morse is no longer a required maritime skill — the Global Maritime Distress and Safety System replaced it in 1999, and the final commercial Morse transmission in the United States went out that year. What survives is genuine, though narrower than most articles suggest:

• Amateur radio. The largest active use by far. CW gets through on weak signals and low power where voice will not, which is why operators still run it by choice.
• Aviation navigation beacons. VOR and NDB stations continuously identify themselves in Morse. Pilots verify they have tuned the right beacon by listening for its two- or three-letter identifier.
• Assistive communication. People with severe motor impairments use single-switch Morse input, where one button and timing replace a keyboard.
• Emergency signaling. SOS by flashlight, mirror or whistle needs no equipment and no power, which is why it is still taught in survival training.

What is not true: Morse is not a standard military communication method, and it is not in routine commercial maritime use. Both claims circulate widely and neither holds up.

How This Page Is Verified

Every code on this page — words, prosigns, Q-codes and abbreviations — was generated directly from the ITU-R Recommendation M.1677-1 character map and checked against it character by character, rather than transcribed by hand. Transmission times are calculated from the PARIS timing standard, where a dot is one unit, a dash is three, the gap inside a letter is one, and the gap between letters is three.

Q-code meanings follow the ITU allocation. Prosign forms are given as the run-together characters they actually are, not as separated letters.

If you find an error, it is an error and we want it reported — contact us.

Changelog

• August 2026 — Full rebuild. Corrected the codes for OFF, QUIET and THANK YOU. Removed a duplicated LIGHT entry. Added prosigns, Q-codes, CW abbreviations, the CQD section and transmission times. Corrected the meanings of SK, 88 and QRM.
• May 2026 — Previous version published.

Last reviewed: August 2026.

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