American Morse Code Translator
Change the speed, pitch, volume and sound style.
How to Use the Translator
- Type any word or sentence — letters, numbers, and punctuation all convert — and the result appears instantly in American Morse.
- Or paste American Morse code instead — the tool detects it and reads it back as plain text.
- Press Play to hear the message with American timing: a dash lasts two dots, L is one long dash, and 0 is the longest dash of all.
- Press Copy to take the translation anywhere.
Typing American Morse by hand: separate words with a slash ( / ), and separate letters with three spaces — a single space is the gap inside C, O, R, Y, and Z, and belongs to the letter itself. Pasted code with single spaces only is read by best fit, the way an operator read by ear and context, but two or three spaces between letters always read exactly. The letter L is a single long dash, written here as ⸺ , and 0 is written as ⸻. Easiest way to start: copy any code straight from the charts on our American Morse code guide and paste it in.
How This Translator Plays American Morse
Most Morse tools play every code with International timing. This one does not. When you press Play, a dash lasts two dots — not three — the letter L is a single dash held twice as long, and the number 0 is the longest signal of all. The five spaced letters (C, O, R, Y, Z) are played with their longer inner pause, so ... . . ... really sounds like SOS did on an American wire: three dots, a split O, three dots.
Use the speed slider to slow the rhythm down while you learn it. At a slow speed you can hear exactly where the inner pauses sit — the detail that made this code fast for experts and unforgiving for beginners. Want the original sound instead of a tone? Set Sound to Telegraph sounder: the code plays as clicks — a sharp click as the key presses down, a softer click as it lifts — the way a landline operator actually heard it.
American Morse vs International Morse
They are two different codes, not two names for one code. American Morse is the original 1840s landline code. International Morse is the later code the world standardized for radio — and it is the code on almost every modern Morse chart. Code copied from a modern chart is International, and it will not read correctly here.
The traps are specific. Eleven letters use different patterns, among them C, F, J, L, O, P, Q, R, X, Y, and Z, and most numbers differ too. The shapes differ as well: American L is one long dash, written ⸺, and 0 is an even longer dash, written ⸻, while five American letters — C, O, R, Y, and Z — carry a space inside the letter itself. International Morse has none of that.
So if your message came from a modern chart, do not try to repair the code by hand. Type the plain text into the translator above and let it write the message in American Morse for you. For every letter, number, and mark side by side, see our American Morse code guide.
And if you actually need the modern code instead, use our Morse Code Translator — it translates International Morse both ways.
Translator FAQs
Does this translator decode American Morse back to text?
Yes. Paste any American Morse into the same box — the tool detects dots and dashes, switches direction on its own, and shows the plain text.
Why does my pasted code read differently than I expected?
Because in American Morse a single space can belong inside a letter. Code pasted with single spaces only is genuinely ambiguous — even human operators resolved it by context, reading by ear. This decoder reads it by best fit. If a reading looks wrong, retype it with three spaces between letters and it will read exactly.
How do I separate letters and words in American Morse?
Put three spaces between letters and a slash ( / ) between words. A single space is never a separator in this code — it is the gap inside the spaced letters C, O, R, Y, and Z. If you are pasting code, two spaces between letters also read exactly.
Why are there three kinds of dashes?
Because American Morse was heard, not read from a screen, and operators told signals apart by length. A normal dash lasts two dots. The long dash lasts four and is the letter L on its own. The extra-long dash lasts five and is the number 0. The lengths carry the meaning — flatten them all into one dash length and L and 0 are lost.
Can I paste code from another website or tool?
Usually, yes. If the code is American Morse, it reads here: this decoder accepts the long-dash shapes ⸺ and ⸻ as well as — and ——, one, two, or three spaces between letters, and the slightly different hyphen that some tools print. What it cannot repair is code that was International Morse to begin with, or code whose long dashes were flattened into plain dashes on the way — by then, L and 0 may already be lost.