so ive been a tech for about two years and just upgraded to general last month, and ive been wanting to get into CW for a while now. not for the license thing obviously since thats not required anymore, just genuinely want to learn it. something about it appeals to me i guess.

anyway im trying to figure out whether i should just start with a straight key or go straight to a paddle with an iambic keyer. i've seen a lot of conflicting stuff online - some people say straight key first so you really internalize the timing, others say just jump to a paddle because thats what youll end up using anyway. my radio is an IC-7300 so the built in keyer is already there which is convenient.

also for actually learning to receive - ive been using the LCWO website which seems decent but im wondering if theres other stuff people recommend. im at like 8wpm right now and it feels like a wall. every time i try to push to 10 it just falls apart. is that normal or am i doing something wrong with how im practicing?

the straight key vs paddle debate is one of those things that will get you 10 different answers from 10 different ops, but here's my honest take after being on CW for about 30 years - start with a straight key for a few weeks, not because its required but because it forces you to really feel the rhythm of each character. when you move to a paddle after that the timing just makes more sense. that said plenty of people have learned fine going straight to paddles so its not a hard rule.

the 8 to 10 wpm wall is totally real and almost everyone hits it. the trick that finally worked for me and i see recommended a lot now is the Koch method, which is kind of what LCWO is based on - but make sure youre learning characters at a higher speed like 15 or 20 wpm with longer spaces between them rather than slowing the actual character speed down. if you slow the characters themselves down you learn the counting method and then you have to unlearn it later. learn the sound of the whole character at speed, even if the word spacing is slow. that click for me around 5 months in and i went from 8 to 15 fairly quickly after that.

also just get on the air even if youre slow, there are slow speed nets specifically for this and people are incredibly patient with new CW ops, way more than you'd expect.

im kind of in the same boat as you actually, learned CW last year and the 8wpm wall got me too for like two months. what helped me weirdly was just listening to QSOs on the bands even when i couldnt copy everything - like just having it on in the background while i did other stuff. not sure if thats scientifically the right way to do it but something started clicking after a while.

i went with a paddle from the start and dont regret it, but i also bought a really cheap one off amazon and honestly that was a mistake. the tension and feel was just weird and i think it made learning harder. ended up getting a used Bencher BY-1 for like 40 bucks and the difference was pretty significant. if your going the paddle route dont cheap out too much on the key itself.