NATO Alphabet Translator

Spell any text in the NATO phonetic alphabet or read code words back into letters, with the official pronunciation and a printable chart.


Letters and digits are replaced with their code words; a space becomes a / and punctuation is left alone. Going the other way, Alpha and Alfa both work, and so does any spelling long enough to be unambiguous.

The full NATO phonetic alphabet

The complete alphabet with the official pronunciation, printable on its own for a desk or a radio room. Capital letters in the pronunciation column mark the stressed syllable.

Letter Code word Say it as Letter Code word Say it as
A Alfa AL fah S Sierra see AIR rah
B Bravo BRAH voh T Tango TANG go
C Charlie CHAR lee U Uniform YOU nee form
D Delta DELL tah V Victor VIK tah
E Echo ECK oh W Whiskey WISS key
F Foxtrot FOKS trot X X-ray ECKS ray
G Golf GOLF Y Yankee YANG key
H Hotel hoh TELL Z Zulu ZOO loo
I India IN dee ah 0 Zero ZE ro
J Juliett JEW lee ett 1 One WUN
K Kilo KEY loh 2 Two TOO
L Lima LEE mah 3 Three TREE
M Mike MIKE 4 Four FOW er
N November no VEM ber 5 Five FIFE
O Oscar OSS cah 6 Six SIX
P Papa pah PAH 7 Seven SEV en
Q Quebec keh BECK 8 Eight AIT
R Romeo ROW me oh 9 Nine NIN er

What the NATO alphabet is for

It exists because B, C, D, E, G, P, T, V and Z all sound alike down a bad line, and because a misheard letter in a call sign, a booking reference or a registration plate is a real problem rather than a small one. Replacing each letter with a whole word that shares no sound with any other word in the set removes the ambiguity: nothing else in the alphabet sounds remotely like Foxtrot. It is properly the ICAO spelling alphabet, adopted for civil aviation in 1956 and picked up by NATO, the emergency services, shipping and, eventually, by anyone who has ever had to read a reference number down the phone.

Why it is Alfa and Juliett, not Alpha and Juliet

Both spellings are deliberate and both exist for people who do not speak English. Alfa is spelled with an f because a reader of many other languages would not know that ph is pronounced f, and might say it as written. Juliett carries a second t because in French a single final t is silent, so Juliet would come out as Julie. The alphabet was designed to be read aloud correctly by a pilot of any nationality on a first reading, so the spelling follows the sound rather than the dictionary. X-ray keeps its hyphen for the same practical reason, and both Whiskey and Whisky are understood.

The numbers are changed on purpose too

Aviation radio does not say the digits the ordinary way. Three becomes tree, four becomes fower, five becomes fife and nine becomes niner, and the reasons are all the same kind of reason: the th sound does not survive a poor signal and does not exist in many languages, four and five can be confused with each other, and nine is too close to the German nein for comfort. Nought is always zero, never oh. If you are reading a reference number aloud, saying niner instead of nine costs nothing and removes one more way to be misheard.

Worth knowing

  • A space in your text becomes a forward slash, which is how word breaks are marked when a message is spelled out.
  • Anything that is not a letter or a digit is passed through unchanged, so punctuation survives the round trip.
  • Decoding is forgiving: any spelling long enough to be unambiguous resolves, so Char, Charlie and Charly all give C.
  • Words that are not recognised come back in square brackets rather than being dropped, so nothing goes missing quietly.
  • The chart prints on its own without the rest of the page, which makes it useful next to a phone or a radio.

Frequently asked questions

A set of 26 code words, one for each letter, chosen so that no two can be confused when spoken over a radio or a bad phone line. Alfa is A, Bravo is B, and so on to Zulu for Z. It is officially the ICAO spelling alphabet, used in aviation, shipping, the emergency services and by anyone reading a reference number aloud.

The official spelling is Alfa, with an f. It is written that way because speakers of many languages would not know that ph is pronounced as an f and would read it literally. Alpha is understood everywhere and this tool accepts both, but Alfa is what appears in the ICAO tables.

To keep it apart from the German nein and from the word five over a poor signal. Aviation radio distorts several digits on purpose for the same reason: three is tree, four is fower and five is fife. Zero is always zero and never oh, because oh sounds like the letter O.

Type it into the box at the top and the code words appear straight away. Read them out one word per letter, leaving a small pause between them. For a name like Nina you would say November India November Alfa.

Yes, switch to NATO to text and paste the code words in. Decoding is deliberately forgiving: it matches on any spelling long enough to be unambiguous, so Alpha, Alfa, Juliet and Juliett all resolve. Words it does not recognise come back in square brackets rather than vanishing.

Morse encodes each letter as a pattern of short and long signals, meant for a tone, a light or a key. The NATO alphabet encodes each letter as a spoken word, meant for a human voice. They solve the same problem for different channels, and both are still in use.

The ICAO alphabet is international and identical everywhere, which is the whole point of it. Individual countries do also have their own domestic spelling alphabets, often using first names or place names, and those are not interchangeable with this one. If you are talking to aviation, shipping or an international call centre, this is the one they will know.

Yes. Press Print the chart and everything else on the page is hidden, so the alphabet comes out on its own with the pronunciation column, which is what makes it worth pinning up next to a phone.

What is the NATO alphabet for each letter?

Alfa, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, Golf, Hotel, India, Juliett, Kilo, Lima, Mike, November, Oscar, Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Uniform, Victor, Whiskey, X-ray, Yankee, Zulu. Type any text above to spell it out, or paste code words in to read them back. Digits have their own words, and several are deliberately distorted: three is tree, nine is niner.