Do You Need Morse Code for a Ham Radio Licence?
This is the single most persistent myth about getting licensed, and it keeps people away who would otherwise be on the air. The requirement was real for most of the twentieth century, which is why anyone who investigated the hobby before 2007 remembers it. It has not applied for nearly twenty years.
When did the Morse code requirement end?
The FCC eliminated the Morse code examination requirement for all amateur licence classes effective 23 February 2007. The change followed a 2003 decision by the International Telecommunication Union to leave code testing to individual national administrations rather than mandating it.
The rollback was gradual. The five-words-per-minute requirement for Technician had already been dropped in 1991 for the Technician No-Code class, and the higher-speed tests for General and Extra were reduced over the following decade. The 2007 order removed the last of it.
Do Technicians still have Morse-only privileges?
Yes, and this surprises people. Technicians hold Morse-only segments on the 15, 40 and 80 metre bands, alongside voice and data access on part of 10 metres. So the licence that no longer requires code grants spectrum where code is the only permitted mode.
Those allocations are genuinely useful. Morse punches through poor conditions at low power far better than voice, so a Technician with a modest transmitter and a wire antenna can make long-distance contacts on 40 metres that voice at the same power would not sustain. Learning code is optional but opens that door.
Is Morse code still used on the air?
Yes, actively. Continuous wave operation remains one of the busiest modes on the high-frequency bands, particularly in contests and for long-distance work at low power. Dedicated segments at the bottom of each HF band are reserved for it, and activity there is steady rather than nostalgic.
Its persistence is practical rather than sentimental. A Morse signal occupies a narrow bandwidth and stays readable at signal levels where voice becomes unintelligible, which makes it efficient for weak-signal work and for operators running a few watts from battery power.
Should you learn Morse code anyway?
Only if it interests you. It is not required for any licence, any band above 30 MHz, or any emergency communication role. Operators who learn it usually do so for the low-power long-distance work it enables, or because they enjoy the skill for its own sake.
If you do want to learn, the common advice is to start with the Koch or Farnsworth method and aim for character recognition by sound rather than by counting dots and dashes. Twenty minutes a day for a few months is a realistic path to conversational speed.
Key takeaways
- The FCC removed Morse code testing for all licence classes on 23 February 2007.
- No current exam element, at any class, tests code proficiency.
- Technicians still hold Morse-only segments on 15, 40 and 80 metres.
- Morse remains widely used because it stays readable at very low signal levels.
- Learning code is entirely optional and unrelated to licence eligibility.
Frequently asked questions
- Did operators licensed before 2007 keep a code endorsement?
- There is no separate endorsement on the modern licence. Operators who passed code exams before 2007 hold the same licence classes as anyone who passed later, with identical privileges. Some choose to note their code history informally, but the FCC record does not distinguish them.
- Do other countries still require Morse code?
- Almost none do. After the ITU removed the international mandate in 2003, national regulators dropped code testing over the following years. A small number of administrations retain optional code endorsements. If you plan to operate abroad, check that country’s regulator rather than assuming US rules apply.
- Can you use Morse code on VHF and UHF?
- Yes. Continuous wave is a permitted mode across the bands Technicians hold above 30 MHz, and it is used for weak-signal work on 6 and 2 metres, including moonbounce and meteor scatter. Activity is much lower than on the HF bands, but the privilege is there.
- What speed counts as usable Morse?
- Around 13 to 15 words per minute handles most casual on-air conversation, and contest operators work considerably faster. The old US Extra requirement was 20 words per minute before it was reduced. There is no minimum now, so you can start making contacts at five words per minute if the other operator slows down.
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