Great Morse Code Practice Tools

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Whether you are a complete Morse Code novice or you want to brush up your copying skills, here are a couple of great websites to get you moving in the right direction.

  Ham Whisperer Morse Code Course

 http://www.hamwhisperer.com/p/morse-code-course.html?

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Learn CW Online:

http://www.lcwo.net

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Next is a couple of links from a useful site, which will allow you to practice at various speeds, using various sources, including RSS feeds from news organizations. You can listen to the feed and then get the text of what was sent to check your work. Great for Morse Code practice!

http://aa9pw.com/morsecode/

http://aa9pw.com/category/morse-code/podcast-morse-code/

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And another great site to practice at various speeds, W1AW's Code Practice MP3 Files website, listing "W1AW code practice transmissions for the dates and speeds indicated. The files are in MP3 format, playable using Windows Media Player, RealPlayer or your favorite MP3 player.

The files are updated every other week."

 http://www.arrl.org/Code-Practice-Files

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Similar to the sites above, there is a program that you can download, "Morse Code Tools," which will also allow you to listen to an RSS feed from various news sources, and will even send you posts from your personal Twitter and Facebook feeds.

http://morse-rss-news.sourceforge.net/

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Update: 15 November, 2013:

G4FON's Morse Trainer (version 9) is a handy tool for learning to copy Morse code under all kinds of varying signal and atmos conditions.

G4FON's Amateur Radio Station Page 

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Update: 20 November, 2013:

Looking for something to copy, but don't have your radio? WebSDR.org is a website that will allow you to monitor others' transceivers remotely using just your computer and the internet. A WebSDR is a Software-Defined Radio receiver connected to the internet, allowing many listeners to listen and tune it simultaneously. SDR technology makes it possible that all listeners tune independently, and thus listen to different signals; this is in contrast to the many classical receivers that are already available via the internet. Of course with this site, you have access to voice as well as Morse code. Who knows, you might be able to copy your target station even better from one of these other receivers.

 http://websdr.org/

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The jury is still out on the usefulness of this next program for decoding Morse. FLDIGI is a program that will (ostensibly) decode Morse code coming through your computer's sound card. So far I have had varying degrees of success. Sometimes it copies perfectly, and other times, not so much. I'm currently experimenting with the settings to see if I can figure it out. Might be great. Might not be. We'll see how it goes with some time and fine tuning. Looks like it might be a great program for some other aspects of ham radio however.

http://www.w1hkj.com/Fldigi.html 

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Update: 22 November, 2013:

Just Learn Morse Code - another site for learning code, including a downloadable program.

http://www.justlearnmorsecode.com/


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Update: 23 November, 2013:

Here is a page full of interesting tools for general amateur operation, as well as Morse applications.

http://www.dxatlas.com/Download.asp
 
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Update: 29 November, 2013: 

Amateur Radio License Study Site 

https://hamstudy.org/


Update: 8 June, 2014: 

Here is a fun webpage to help with receiving and sending Morse Code:

Morse Code Sending / Receiving Machine


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 Update: 10 June, 2014: 

Practice listening to Morse Code for extended periods of time:

"Old Man and the Sea" in Morse

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Update: 10 June, 2014: 

Morse Resource - Morse Podcasts

http://www.morseresource.com/

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Update: 31 October, 2014

DARC Morse Code Class 2012 - Lesson 1 of 59
Look for the audio file:

https://archive.org/details/DarcMorseCodeClassOnTheAir-Class1-letterseAndt

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Update: 26 December, 2015

Enjoy the Code - Morse Code for the Real World

http://enjoythecode.com/

Back in the early 90's, I went through Morse Code school at Fort Devens, MA., and became a "Morse Interceptor" with the U.S. Air Force. I copied code for several years. Eventually, I cross-trained into another career, but still have a fondness for the dits and dahs.

I actually had an amateur radio license before attending the Morse school, but I never made the time to use it. Now I'm considering getting back into the amateur radio hobby, but I've long since let that license expire, so I will have to test again. That is ok, because last time, it seems the hardest thing to learn was the Morse, and of course there is no requirement for that anymore, even though I can still copy much faster than the 5wpm that was initially such a challenge.

Once I have that license reinstated, I will most likely choose to use a low power (QRP) radio transmitting Morse Code, simply because that seems like a bit of a challenge and, somehow, more interesting to me. I'll have to brush up on my code copying abilities though, so I've been looking for some good resources to get myself back up to speed. Above is a list of the most useful ones I've found. I will continue to update this post.

Here is a link to documentary videos and audio regarding Morse code.

Morse Code Documentary videos and audio.




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