NATO Phonetic Alphabet

The international spelling alphabet: Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and so on through Zulu, one word per letter, chosen so letters cannot be confused over bad audio. It is the standard in aviation, shipping, and emergency services.

Type it into the box above and read off the words: JANE becomes Juliett Alpha November Echo. Handy for phone calls with confirmation numbers, names, and postcodes.

Digits are spoken with a few special pronunciations for clarity: three is TREE, five is FIFE, nine is NINER, and thousand is TOUSAND, all chosen to survive radio static.

The official ICAO spellings avoid ambiguity for non-English speakers: Alfa because ph is not pronounced f in many languages, and Juliett because a single final t is silent in French. Both spellings are the standard, even though they look odd in English.