The code words have been stable since 1956. Numbers are spoken as English digits, but with the pronunciations of three, four, five, nine, and thousand modified. 'Alfa' and 'Juliett' are intentionally spelled as such to avoid mispronunciation NATO would do the same with 'Xray'. The 26 code words are as follows (ICAO spellings): 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. The words were chosen to be accessible to speakers of English, French and Spanish.Īlthough spelling alphabets are commonly called 'phonetic alphabets', they should not be confused with phonetic transcription systems such as the International Phonetic Alphabet.

In 1956, NATO modified the then-current set of code words used by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) this modification then became the international standard when it was accepted by ICAO that year and by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) a few years later.

The specific code words varied, as some seemingly distinct words were found to be ineffective in real-life conditions. To create the code, a series of international agencies assigned 26 code words acrophonically to the letters of the Roman alphabet, with the intention of the letters and numbers being easily distinguishable from one another over radio and telephone, regardless of language barriers and connection quality. The ITU phonetic alphabet and figure code is a rarely used variant that differs in the code words for digits. Technically a radiotelephonic spelling alphabet, it goes by various names, including NATO spelling alphabet, ICAO phonetic alphabet and ICAO spelling alphabet. The (International) Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet, commonly known as the NATO phonetic alphabet, is the most widely used set of clear code words for communicating the letters of the Roman alphabet. FAA radiotelephony alphabet and Morse code chart Problems playing this file? See media help.

Spelling of letters in english alphabet