Ham Calls is an add-on for NVDA that makes amateur radio call signs easier to understand through speech.
Speech synthesizers often pronounce combinations of letters and numbers as words. Ham Calls can instead speak each character separately or use phonetics. Braille output is not changed.
Ham Calls requires NVDA 2026.1 or later.
Download the latest .nvda-addon package from the GitHub Releases page. Open the downloaded file, follow NVDA's installation prompts, and restart NVDA when prompted.
Press NVDA+Alt+H to cycle through the three speaking modes:
- Off: Speech is unchanged. This is the default.
- Letters:
K1ABCis spoken asK 1 A B C. - Phonetics:
K1ABCis spoken asKilo 1 Alpha Bravo Charlie.
NVDA announces the newly selected mode. The mode is saved between NVDA sessions.
You can also select the mode under NVDA Settings > Ham Calls. The keyboard command can be changed from NVDA's Input Gestures dialog under the Ham Calls category.
Ham Calls processes letter-and-number combinations immediately before NVDA sends them to the speech synthesizer. For example:
| Original | Letters mode | Phonetics mode |
|---|---|---|
Q0ZZZ |
Q 0 Z Z Z |
Quebec 0 Zulu Zulu Zulu |
WE9XYZ |
W E 9 X Y Z |
Whiskey Echo 9 X-ray Yankee Zulu |
K1ABC/P |
K 1 A B C Stroke P |
Kilo 1 Alpha Bravo Charlie Stroke Papa |
Letters mode always converts call-sign letters to uppercase, and phonetics mode always capitalizes each phonetic word. Internal slash characters are spoken as "Stroke." Punctuation and surrounding text are preserved.
Ham Calls recognizes a one-to-three character prefix, a separator digit, and a one-to-four letter suffix, including common reciprocal prefixes and operating suffixes such as DL/K1ABC/P. Length limits and token boundaries prevent paths, URLs, email addresses, and ordinary letter-and-number identifiers from being spelled character by character.
To update Ham Calls, download a newer .nvda-addon package from the GitHub Releases page and install it over the existing version.
Report problems or request features through GitHub Issues. When reporting a pronunciation problem, please include:
- The exact text NVDA attempted to speak
- The selected Ham Calls mode
- Your NVDA version
- The speech synthesizer being used
- The expected and actual pronunciation
Ham Calls is free software licensed under the GNU General Public License version 2 or later.