ok so ive been listening on HF for a few weeks now and i keep hearing and seeing all these weird abbreviations and codes, like QSL, QRM, QRN, QTH and i have no idea what half of them mean. i know QSL is like a confirmation card thing but the rest im lost on. also people on the nets seem to just throw them around constantly in conversation not just in CW which i didnt expect. is there like a master list or something i should just memorize or do people only really use a handful of them in practice? and whats the difference between using these on voice vs morse, do they mean the same thing either way

yeah there's a ton of them but honestly you only really need to know maybe 20 or so for everyday use. QSL is yeah confirmation, QTH is your location, QRM is man-made interference (like from another station), QRN is natural static like lightning crashes, QRZ means "who is calling me" which you hear constantly on SSB, QSY means change frequency, QRT means shutting down, QRX means stand by basically. oh and QSO just means a contact or conversation. people use them on voice out of habit more than anything, technically they were designed for CW to save time but they stuck around. theres a full ITU list online if you want all of them but most of the obscure ones you'll probably never hear in the wild. just listen and context usually makes it obvious what they mean

same boat as you were a few months ago lol. what helped me was just keeping a little cheat sheet next to the radio and whenever i heard something i didnt recognize i'd look it up after. after a while they just kind of stick. QRP is another big one, means low power operation, like under 5 watts. theres whole groups dedicated to QRP operating. also 73 isnt technically a Q code but everyone says it and it just means best regards or basically goodbye. and 88 means love and kisses which you hear some people use but not super common. dont stress about memorizing all of them at once