Your Name in Morse Code

How a name becomes Morse code

Morse code has no special rules for names. Each letter is replaced by its International Morse pattern, in order, with a short gap between letters. A name with two parts (a first and last name, or a double-barrelled first name) gets a longer gap, written as a slash, between the parts. Capitalisation does not exist in Morse, so Lily, LILY and lily all produce .-.. .. .-.. -.--. The translator above shows the result as text, as a row of dots and dashes you can trace, and as one card per letter that you can click to hear.

Short names make short codes, but not always in the way you expect. The length depends on which letters you use, not how many: E is a single dot and T a single dash, while J, Q and Y are four symbols each. "Emma" is only 7 symbols; "Jack" is 13. The stats line under the translator counts dots and dashes for you, which matters when you are deciding whether a name will fit on a bracelet or a ring.

Names with accents, apostrophes or hyphens

International Morse covers the 26 letters A–Z, the digits and a handful of punctuation marks. It does not have codes for accented letters, so the translator maps them to the base letter: José becomes JOSE, Zoë becomes ZOE, Søren becomes SOREN and Müller becomes MULLER. That is also what a telegraph operator would have sent. A few national variants add characters (Spanish operators have a code for Ñ, German for Ä, Ö and Ü), but they are not part of the international standard and most people reading your bracelet will not know them.

Apostrophes and hyphens do have codes (.----. and -....-), so O'Brien and Mary-Kate translate faithfully. On jewelry, though, six-symbol punctuation takes a lot of room; most people drop it and write OBRIEN or MARY KATE with a word gap. Numbers are fine: a name followed by a birth year works and each digit is exactly five symbols.

Using a name in Morse code on a bracelet or necklace

Morse code jewelry is the most common reason people translate a name. The usual convention is simple: small round beads for dots, long tube beads for dashes, and a short stretch of bare cord or a tiny spacer bead between letters. Lily, for example, is L (3 round, 1 tube), I (2 round), L again, and Y (1 round, 3 tube), which is exactly the kind of counting that goes wrong by hand. Copy the code from the translator and count from the text instead: in .-.. .. .-.. -.-- there are 9 dots and 5 dashes, in four groups.

Three practical tips. First, keep the gaps visible; a bracelet without letter gaps cannot be read back, even by an expert. Second, choose a start marker (a bead of a different colour) so the wearer knows which way to read, because several letters are mirror images of each other. Third, if the name is long, consider initials, which fit on almost anything. Our Morse code jewelry guide covers bead sizes and layouts in detail.

A name in Morse code as a tattoo

Names of children, partners and parents are the most common Morse code tattoos: discreet, personal, and readable only by people who know the code or care enough to look it up. Before booking, run the name through the translator, print the dots and dashes, and ask the artist to keep the letter gaps slightly wider than the gaps inside a letter. Then decode the stencil yourself using the picture translator before the needle touches skin. The Morse code tattoo page has placement ideas and real-world examples of designs that read correctly.

Sending a name by sound or light

Press Listen to hear the name at the chosen speed; 10–12 WPM is slow enough for a beginner to follow. The same rhythm works with a flashlight, a phone torch or taps on a table: short for a dot, three times longer for a dash, with a clear pause between letters. Children pick this up quickly, and sending each other's names is a classic first exercise in our Morse code for kids guide.