NATO Phonetic Alphabet — Chart & Spelling Converter
Alfa to Zulu with ICAO pronunciation, numbers, older alphabets and a wallet card. Type anything to spell it out.
NATO Phonetic Alphabet (ICAO / ITU)
NATO phonetic alphabet chart (A–Z)#
| Letter | Code word | Say it (ICAO) |
|---|---|---|
| A | Alfa | AL fah |
| B | Bravo | BRAH voh |
| C | Charlie | CHAR lee or SHAR lee |
| D | Delta | DELL tah |
| E | Echo | ECK oh |
| F | Foxtrot | FOKS trot |
| G | Golf | GOLF |
| H | Hotel | hoh TELL |
| I | India | IN dee ah |
| J | Juliett | JEW lee ETT |
| K | Kilo | KEY loh |
| L | Lima | LEE mah |
| M | Mike | MIKE |
| N | November | no VEM ber |
| O | Oscar | OSS cah |
| P | Papa | pah PAH |
| Q | Quebec | keh BECK |
| R | Romeo | ROW me oh |
| S | Sierra | see AIR rah |
| T | Tango | TANG go |
| U | Uniform | YOU nee form or OO nee form |
| V | Victor | VIK tah |
| W | Whiskey | WISS key |
| X | X-ray | ECKS ray |
| Y | Yankee | YANG key |
| Z | Zulu | ZOO loo |
Capitals mark the stressed syllable. “Alfa” and “Juliett” are the official spellings: Alfa so that speakers of languages where “ph” is not read as f still say it right, and Juliett with two t’s so French speakers do not drop the final t.
Numbers: ICAO and maritime (ITU) pronunciation#
| Digit | Word | Say it (ICAO) | Maritime figure code (ITU) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Zero | ZE-RO | Nadazero |
| 1 | One | WUN | Unaone |
| 2 | Two | TOO | Bissotwo |
| 3 | Three | TREE | Terrathree |
| 4 | Four | FOW-er | Kartefour |
| 5 | Five | FIFE | Pantafive |
| 6 | Six | SIX | Soxisix |
| 7 | Seven | SEV-en | Setteseven |
| 8 | Eight | AIT | Oktoeight |
| 9 | Nine | NIN-er | Novenine |
| Decimal point | Decimal | DAY-SEE-MAL | Decimal |
| Hundred | Hundred | HUN-dred | — |
| Thousand | Thousand | TOU-SAND | — |
| Full stop | — | — | Stop |
Aviation reads numbers digit by digit (“flight level two four zero”, “one one niner decimal two”), except whole hundreds and thousands: 2,500 is “two thousand five hundred”. Ships may use the ITU figure words when a number must survive a bad link.
Letters people mishear (and why the code words help)#
| Letters | Why they get confused |
|---|---|
| B D E G P T V Z C | The “ee” set: they differ only in the first consonant, which a phone line cuts off. |
| M N | Both nasal; almost identical on a narrow-band line. |
| F S X | “eff”, “ess” and “ecks” share the vowel; the hiss of S and F is lost in noise. |
| A J K | All rhyme with “day”. |
| I Y | “eye” and “why” differ only in the glide. |
| Q U W | “cue”, “you” and “double-you” all end in the same vowel. |
| 0 O, 1 I L, 5 S, 8 B | Not a sound problem but a reading one: read codes aloud by character type (“Zero”, not “Oh”). |
Older and alternative spelling alphabets#
For recognising them in old films, documents or police radio. For anything official, use the NATO/ICAO words above.
| Letter | NATO / ICAO | RAF (Royal Air Force) 1921–1942 | US/UK “Able Baker” (CCB) 1943–1955 | LAPD / APCO police alphabet still used by some US police agencies |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Alfa | Apple | Able | Adam |
| B | Bravo | Beer | Baker | Boy |
| C | Charlie | Charlie | Charlie | Charles |
| D | Delta | Don | Dog | David |
| E | Echo | Edward | Easy | Edward |
| F | Foxtrot | Freddie | Fox | Frank |
| G | Golf | George | George | George |
| H | Hotel | Harry | How | Henry |
| I | India | Ink | Item | Ida |
| J | Juliett | Johnnie | Jig | John |
| K | Kilo | King | King | King |
| L | Lima | London | Love | Lincoln |
| M | Mike | Monkey | Mike | Mary |
| N | November | Nuts | Nan | Nora |
| O | Oscar | Orange | Oboe | Ocean |
| P | Papa | Pip | Peter | Paul |
| Q | Quebec | Queen | Queen | Queen |
| R | Romeo | Robert | Roger | Robert |
| S | Sierra | Sugar | Sugar | Sam |
| T | Tango | Toc | Tare | Tom |
| U | Uniform | Uncle | Uncle | Union |
| V | Victor | Vic | Victor | Victor |
| W | Whiskey | William | William | William |
| X | X-ray | X-ray | X-ray | X-ray |
| Y | Yankee | Yorker | Yoke | Young |
| Z | Zulu | Zebra | Zebra | Zebra |
Printable wallet card#
Found a problem, or something that could be better? We read every message and we fix things quickly.
The NATO phonetic alphabet assigns a code word to each letter, Alfa for A through Zulu for Z, so that letters survive a bad phone line, a radio channel or a listener with a different accent. Its official name is the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet; ICAO, the ITU and NATO all use the same 26 words, which have not changed since 1956.
Type a booking reference, a postcode, a serial number or a name into the converter and it is spelled out word by word, ready to copy or to read aloud with your browser’s built-in voice. The chart below gives the official spellings and ICAO’s pronunciation guide, the number words pilots and sailors use, and the older alphabets you still hear in films and on police radio. Symbols such as @ or # have no official code word, so the converter names them in plain English and says so.
How to use
- Type or paste the text you need to spell out; the code words appear instantly.
- Choose how digits are spoken: plain (One, Two), aviation (Wun, Too, Niner) or ITU maritime (Unaone, Bissotwo).
- Tick “Say upper/lower case” when reading out a password where case matters.
- Copy the result as one line or as a letter-by-letter list, or press Read aloud to hear it.
- Use the chart, search box and #anchors to look up a single letter, or print the chart or wallet card.
Frequently asked questions
What is the NATO phonetic alphabet?
It is the spelling alphabet in which each letter is replaced by a code word: 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. Its formal name is the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet. ICAO introduced the final version on 1 March 1956 and NATO adopted it the same year.
Why is it spelled Alfa and Juliett instead of Alpha and Juliet?
Both spellings are deliberate. “Alpha” could be misread by speakers of languages where “ph” is not pronounced as f, so the official word is Alfa. Juliett has a double t because French speakers would otherwise treat a single final t as silent. Many websites and apps still print Alpha and Juliet, but the ICAO and ITU documents use Alfa and Juliett.
How do you say numbers in the phonetic alphabet?
ICAO gives the pronunciations ZE-RO, WUN, TOO, TREE, FOW-er, FIFE, SIX, SEV-en, AIT and NIN-er, plus DAY-SEE-MAL for the decimal point, HUN-dred and TOU-SAND. Numbers are read digit by digit, except whole hundreds and thousands: 2,500 is “two thousand five hundred”. Ships may use the ITU figure code words instead, such as Unaone, Bissotwo and Novenine.
Why do pilots say “niner” instead of nine?
Niner is ICAO’s official pronunciation of 9. The extra syllable keeps it distinct from five, which sounds similar on a noisy radio channel. In the same way, five is pronounced FIFE, three TREE and four FOW-er.
Is the NATO alphabet the same as the police phonetic alphabet?
Not always. Many US police departments, including the LAPD, still use the older APCO alphabet that starts Adam, Boy, Charles, David, Edward. APCO itself adopted the ICAO alphabet in 1974, so newer agencies and most emergency services elsewhere use Alfa, Bravo, Charlie. The comparison table on this page lists both.
Does the converter send what I type anywhere?
No. Spelling happens in your browser, and Read aloud uses your device’s own speech engine. That makes it safe to spell out reference numbers or passwords, although reading a password aloud is still best done where nobody else can hear.
How to spell something over the phone so it is understood first time
The code words only help if the listener knows which part is a code word and which part is the message. A few habits used by call centres, air traffic control and support desks make the difference:
• Group long strings. Read a 10-character reference as two groups of five, with a short pause, and wait for the listener to confirm each group.
• Say the type of character when it matters: “number zero” rather than “oh”, “capital Alfa” or “lowercase alfa” for passwords. Booking codes often avoid 0/O and 1/I precisely because of this.
• Spell only the risky part. For an email address, say the name normally, then spell it: “j smith, Juliett Sierra Mike India Tango Hotel, at example dot com”.
• Ask for a read-back. Pilots repeat clearances back to the controller; doing the same with a reference number catches almost every error.
• Do not mix systems. “A as in apple, B as in boy” works between two people who share a language, but the listener has to process a new word every time. Fixed code words are faster because both sides already know them.
Where the alphabet came from
Spelling alphabets go back to the telephone and early radio. The Royal Air Force used one from 1921 (Apple, Beer, Charlie…), and from 1943 the US and British forces shared the “Able Baker” alphabet (Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog, Easy…). Those words worked for English speakers but not for the growing number of international pilots and controllers.
ICAO commissioned a new alphabet after the Second World War and tested candidate words with speakers of English, French and Spanish, the working languages of aviation at the time. A first version came into use in 1951; after complaints about some words, the final list, the one still in use, took effect on 1 March 1956. NATO adopted it the same year, which is where the popular name comes from, and the ITU adopted it for maritime and amateur radio.
The alphabet has not changed since, so any chart that differs from the one above is either using an older or local alphabet (like the LAPD’s Adam, Boy, Charles) or simply has a spelling mistake (Alpha, Juliet).
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