Is Morse Code Still Used Today?

Amateur Radio: CW Is Alive and Busy

The amateur radio community calls Morse code "CW," short for continuous wave, the type of radio signal a Morse transmission produces. CW is the oldest operating mode in amateur radio, predating voice transmission by about two decades. It is also, per unit of bandwidth, the most efficient mode that human operators can use without a computer generating the signal for them.

For years, critics predicted that once licensing bodies dropped the Morse requirement, interest would collapse. The opposite happened. In the United States, the FCC removed the requirement for all amateur radio license classes in February 2007. Participation in CW operating has grown since then, partly because people now choose CW out of genuine interest rather than reluctant obligation. The CQ World Wide CW Contest, held each November, regularly draws tens of thousands of participants from over 100 countries. That is not a niche activity.

Operators who work CW seriously can copy code at 30 to 40 words per minute, which is faster than most people type on a full keyboard. At that speed, an experienced operator barely thinks about the individual letters; the patterns of dots and dashes become as automatic as reading words by shape. A skilled operator can decode signals by ear that a voice radio operator would hear as nothing but hiss.

The practical reason for this devotion is DXing: making contact with distant stations. A CW signal occupies roughly 150 to 500 Hz of radio spectrum. A comparable single-sideband voice transmission takes 2,400 to 3,000 Hz. A narrower signal concentrates the same transmitter power into a smaller slice of spectrum, which translates directly into a better signal-to-noise ratio at the receiving end. Operators running low power from portable setups, known as QRP operation, regularly make transatlantic and transpacific contacts on CW with transmitters putting out just 5 watts, roughly the output of a standard LED light bulb.

Try the morse code translator on this site if you want to practice converting text to CW or hear what a word sounds like in code.

Aviation VOR Beacons: Morse From 30,000 Feet

Every time a commercial or private pilot tunes a VHF omnidirectional range beacon, known as a VOR, the navigation receiver also picks up a Morse identifier broadcast continuously by that station. The identifier is a two- or three-letter code, like ... ..-. --- for SFO (San Francisco), that confirms the pilot has tuned the correct station and not an adjacent one on a nearby frequency.

Pilots do not need to decode the Morse by ear. Modern avionics display the identifier as text. But the Morse signal itself is still being broadcast, still required by aviation standards, and still received. Even aircraft with fully digital glass cockpits that rely primarily on GPS receive and decode the VOR Morse identifier in the background.

The reason thousands of VOR beacons worldwide are still operating in 2026 is straightforward: GPS can fail, be jammed, or be spoofed. VOR provides an independent, ground-based navigation reference that does not depend on satellites. The FAA published a Minimum Operational Network plan that identified which VORs would be retained as a GPS backup infrastructure. The result is that while some VORs have been decommissioned, the network remains large and the Morse identifiers remain part of the standard.

Assistive Technology: One Switch, Full Alphabet

This is probably the area of Morse code growth that surprises people most. For individuals who cannot use standard keyboards or touchscreens due to conditions like ALS, cerebral palsy, spinal cord injury, or other motor disabilities, Morse code can provide full text input through a single physical switch.

The principle is simple. A dot is a short press. A dash is a longer press. The phone or tablet decodes the timing and converts combinations of dots and dashes into letters and numbers. A person might use a button held in one hand, a switch mounted near their head, a sip-and-puff device, or even a system that detects the duration of an eye blink.

Apple integrated Morse input into iOS and iPadOS via Switch Control in 2018. That same year, Google added Morse input to Gboard on Android. Both implementations are built into the operating system at no extra cost, which is a significant shift from the specialized, often expensive assistive technology tools that preceded them. A person with limited motor control can now pick up any iPhone or Android device, enable Switch Control or Gboard Morse mode, and have access to the entire keyboard, including emoji.

For more context on how Morse code has evolved as a communication system, see the history of Morse code.

Military and Intelligence Use

Current military use of Morse code is not well documented in open sources, which is itself part of the point. HF radio operating on high-frequency shortwave bands can reach thousands of miles with minimal infrastructure. A Morse transmission on HF occupies a very narrow slice of spectrum, making it harder to locate via direction-finding than a voice signal. It also works at signal levels that would make voice communication unintelligible.

Several special operations forces and military training programs worldwide have retained Morse in their curricula. The specifics are not public. What is documented is that Morse remains part of the skill set for certain military communication roles, particularly those that might require operating with minimal equipment, under emissions-control conditions, or in environments where digital communication infrastructure is unavailable.

Why Morse Persists: The Physics Are Hard to Argue With

Strip away the nostalgia and you are left with three properties that no other simple communication mode matches simultaneously.

First, bandwidth. A CW signal is extraordinarily narrow, as described above. In crowded radio spectrum, that matters enormously. A single frequency slot that holds one voice transmission can hold dozens of CW contacts running simultaneously, each occupying its own thin sliver of the band.

Second, noise performance. Human operators, and the software decoders that assist them, can extract Morse from signal-to-noise ratios that make voice completely useless. Operators using weak-signal digital modes like FT8 have pushed this even further, but CW remains the benchmark for what a skilled human can do with their ears and a receiver.

Third, equipment simplicity. A working Morse transmitter can be built from a handful of components: an oscillator, an amplifier, a key to switch it on and off, and a wire strung up as an antenna. No voice codec. No digital signal processor. No firmware to update. This makes Morse attractive in emergency communication scenarios where commercial infrastructure has failed and operators are working from improvised or stored equipment.

Pop Culture and General Awareness

Morse SOS, ... --- ..., is one of the most recognized signals in the world among people who know nothing else about the code. It appears in films, video games, escape rooms, and novels as a shorthand for "someone is in trouble." This cultural familiarity is not trivial. It keeps new people curious about Morse, feeds a steady stream of beginners into the amateur radio hobby, and sustains a market for learning resources.

Escape room designers in particular have embraced Morse as a puzzle element because it is unfamiliar enough to feel like a cipher but accessible enough that participants can figure it out with a reference card. That is a narrow Goldilocks zone that few other codes occupy. You can also browse common Morse code words to see the patterns that come up most often in practice.

The Bottom Line

Morse code is not a museum piece. It is a working communications tool used every day by hundreds of thousands of amateur radio operators, encoded in the signals of aviation navigation beacons overhead, and increasingly adopted as an accessible input method for people who need it most. It has outlasted predictions of its death for more than a century, and the technical reasons for its longevity have not changed. A mode this efficient in spectrum use, this tolerant of poor conditions, and this buildable from simple parts does not go quietly.

The question of whether Morse code is still used has a clear answer. The more interesting question is what it will still be doing in another fifty years.

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