Morse code escape room
You wake in an old coastal radio station with the tide rising. Five locked doors stand between you and the lifeboat, and each opens only when you read the Morse behind it: a radio, a signal lamp, a notebook, knocks through a wall and a keypad. Every game is generated fresh, so there is always a new station to escape.
The silent signal station
- Five rooms, each locked by a word or code hidden in a different form of Morse.
- Hints come in steps when you need them; each adds 30 seconds.
- Get out of all five in the fastest time you can. Every game is new.
You wake in an old coastal radio station as the tide rises. SOS became the international distress signal in 1908, and this station kept watch for it for decades. Five locked doors stand between you and the lifeboat. Read the Morse behind each one.
- 1Enter the stationThe clock starts and the first clue plays
- 2Read the clueListen, watch, study the page or count knocks
- 3Replay the clueAt normal speed or slower, with the Code chart
How to play
- Press Enter the station. The clock starts and the first clue plays at once.
- Read the clue in its own way: listen, watch, study the page, count the knocks or look at the keypad.
- Replay it as often as you like, at normal speed or slower. Open the Code chart whenever you need it.
- Type the word and press Unlock. At the last door, press the keys for the code on the note, then Enter.
- Stuck? Take a hint, at a cost of 30 seconds. Escape through all five doors to stop the clock.
The five rooms
- The radio room: a word, heard. Play it again, or slower.
- The lamp room: a word flashed on a small signal lamp. If your system asks for reduced motion, it is drawn as a timed strip instead: the same flashes, to scale.
- The operator's desk: a word in pencil with some of the gaps between letters smudged away, so it can be split more than one way. Any real word that fits the signal opens the door.
- The locked store: someone knocks through the wall. A light tap is a dot, a heavy thud is a dash.
- The last door: the code is on a note, but the keypad's keys are labeled only in Morse, in a shuffled order.
Each room has two hints, and each one adds 30 seconds to your time. The code chart is free. Your best time is kept on this device.
How it works
Every game draws a fresh answer for each room. The radio, lamp, notebook and knocking rooms each have their own list of sea and rescue words, with no word in two lists. The keypad code is four random digits.
The radio and the knocks play at 15 WPM, and the slower button plays them at 8 WPM. The lamp flashes at 7 WPM (5 with the slower button), under three flashes a second.
By the PARIS standard one unit lasts 1,200 ms divided by the WPM: 80 ms at 15 WPM, 150 ms at 8 and about 171 ms at 7. A dot is one unit, a dash three, with one unit between marks, three between letters and seven between words.
The knocks keep exact Morse timing. Each mark becomes one knock at the moment it would start; a mark longer than two units is a heavy thud (a dash) and a shorter one is a light tap (a dot). The pauses between letters are what you count by.
In the notebook, at least one gap between letters is smudged away, and never all of them: about half go. The door accepts the written word or any real word that sends the same unbroken run of marks.
Your final time is the seconds on the clock plus 30 for every hint you took, rounded to the second.
Examples
What each room gives you, with words it can use:
| Room | Clue | What you get | Sample answers |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. The radio room | Sound | A word heard as tones | HARBOR, BEACON |
| 2. The lamp room | Light | A word flashed on a lamp | NORTH, KEEL |
| 3. The operator's desk | Pencil | Code with some letter gaps missing | RADIO, QUEEN |
| 4. The locked store | Knocks | Taps for dots, thuds for dashes | HELP, DOOR |
| 5. The last door | Keypad | Keys labeled only in Morse | A 4-digit code |
.-..- -.. ..--- on a smudged notebook page can be split two ways. Split as R A, D, I O, it is RADIO; split as A U, D, I O, it is AUDIO. Both open the door.
The keypad digits, which are easy once you see the pattern:
| Digit | Morse | Digit | Morse |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | .---- | 6 | -.... |
| 2 | ..--- | 7 | --... |
| 3 | ...-- | 8 | ---.. |
| 4 | ....- | 9 | ----. |
| 5 | ..... | 0 | ----- |
Every digit is five marks. From 1 to 5 the dots grow from the left; from 6 to 0 the dashes do. Count the dots at the front, or the dashes, and you have the digit.
The history in the story
The station's story is fiction, but its facts are real. SOS was agreed as the international distress signal at the Berlin radiotelegraph convention of 1906 and came into force in 1908. Ships called for help in Morse on 500 kHz.
On the night of 14 to 15 April 1912, Titanic's wireless operators sent CQD, the older Marconi distress call, and later SOS. Morse distress watch at sea ended on 1 February 1999, when the Global Maritime Distress and Safety System came fully into force.
Good questions
Frequently asked questions.
About the escape room
Is the escape room different every time?
Yes. Each game picks a new answer for every room from its own word list, a new four-digit code and a new order for the keypad keys. The five rooms always come in the same order.
How do hints work?
Each room has two hints. The first gives the number of letters and the first letter (or how digits are built, at the keypad). The second writes the answer out in dots and dashes.
Each hint adds 30 seconds to your time. The code chart is free.
Why does more than one word open the notebook door?
Some gaps between letters have been smudged away, so the code can be split more than one way. RADIO and AUDIO send exactly the same marks, for example. Any real word that fits the page opens the door, and the game tells you which word was written.
Can I play it with the sound off?
Partly. The lamp, the notebook and the keypad need no sound. The radio room and the knocking need it, unless you take the second hint, which writes the code out.
Is the flashing lamp safe?
Yes. The lamp keeps to the site's flash limit: 7 WPM, or 5 WPM if you choose to flash it slower, which is under three flashes a second. With reduced motion turned on in your system, it doesn't flash at all: the same signal is drawn as a timed strip, with each flash to scale.
Is the history in the story true?
Yes, though the station is made up.
- SOS was agreed in Berlin in 1906 and came into force in 1908.
- 500 kHz was the Morse distress frequency at sea.
- Titanic sent CQD and later SOS in April 1912.
- Morse distress watch ended in 1999 with the GMDSS.
Is it good for a classroom or party?
It works well as a team game on one screen: one person reads the clue, another checks the code chart. Each game is new, so teams can also race each other on separate devices.
Trust and limits
Private by design.
Honest about limits.
On your device
Runs in your browser
Sounds and flashes are made on your device, and your best time is saved on this device only.Know the limits
A made-up story
The station and its story are made up; the history in it is not.ITU-R M.1677-1
International Morse
Words and codes are International Morse (ITU-R M.1677-1), letters and digits only. Maintained by Translate Morse Code, an independent site; last updated November 2026.