so ive been thinking about getting into CW for a while now, mostly because i keep hearing people talk about how much better it is for weak signal stuff and i finally got my general ticket so i figure now is as good a time as any to try

the thing is i have no idea where to even start. like do you just memorize the dots and dashes on a chart or is there some better way to go about it? i downloaded a couple apps but they all seem kind of different in their approach and i dont know which one to actually stick with. someone at my club mentioned the Koch method but i didnt really follow what they were explaining

i guess what im asking is how did you guys actually learn it and what would you do differently if you had to start over

okay so the chart thing, dont do that, seriously it'll slow you down way more than you think because you end up counting dits and dahs in your head and then you're stuck doing that forever and you'll hit a wall around 10-12 wpm that you just cant seem to break through

the Koch method your club buddy mentioned is actually pretty solid, the idea is you learn each character at a fast speed like 20wpm right from the start but with extra spacing between characters so you have time to think, and then as you improve you close up the spacing. theres an app called LC Keyer and also LCWO dot net which is a website that does exactly this. i used LCWO when i picked it back up after years away from it and honestly within a few weeks i was copying better than i ever did when i originally learned by counting

the other thing nobody tells you is that just doing practice exercises isnt enough, you gotta listen to actual QSOs even when you cant copy everything. just leaving 40m on in the background while youre doing other stuff around the shack helps your brain start recognizing the rhythm of real code, not just the clean computer generated stuff

im in basically the same boat as you so take this with a grain of salt but i started about two months ago using an app called Morse Mania on my phone and its pretty good for just getting the letters into your head. im nowhere near ready to get on the air but i can copy maybe 8-10 wpm in short bursts now which feels like a lot considering i knew nothing in january

what helped me was doing like 10-15 minutes every single day rather than trying to cram for an hour on weekends, consistency really seems to matter more than the total time