so ive been thinking about learning CW for a while now but every time i look into it i get overwhelmed by all the different methods and opinions and honestly i dont even know what the right approach is. some people say learn with a straight key first, others say dont bother and just use a paddle from the start, some say use an app, some say apps are bad and you should only listen to actual QSOs. i took the technician exam last year and just upgraded to general a few months ago so i dont need code for the license anymore obviously but i just feel like im missing something by not knowing it.

is there like a sensible starting point for someone who literally has never done any of this? i tried one of those online things a while back and could never get past like 4 or 5 letters before i gave up. not sure if i was doing it wrong or just not practicing enough or what

the thing that finally clicked for me after years of halfhearted attempts was the Koch method, specifically just committing to it and not skipping ahead. the idea is you start with just two characters at full speed, like 20wpm, and you dont add a new one until you can copy those two at like 90% accuracy. sounds slow but it works because your brain learns the sound as a whole thing instead of counting dits and dahs which is the trap everyone falls into.

LC Wouff Hong and the LCWO website are both good for this. LCWO is free and you can track your progress session by session. the other thing i'd say is dont stress about sending yet, just focus on receiving for the first few weeks. once you can copy in your head a little bit then messing around with a key starts to make more sense. i also listened to slow speed code nets on like 40 meters just to hear real traffic even when i couldnt decode most of it, just getting used to the rhythm helped a lot

honestly just download morse-it or one of those phone apps and mess around on your commute or whatever. thats what i did and i mean im not great at it but i can pull calls out of a pileup now which is more than i could do a year ago. the thing nobody tells you is its just repetition, like theres no trick, you just have to hear the same letters so many times your brain stops thinking about it. i still count dits sometimes when im tired lol but it does get better