The M17 Project

M17 is a new digital radio protocol in development for data and voice, made by and for amateur radio operators.

Our protocol's voice mode uses the free and open Codec 2 voice encoder. This means there are no patents, no royalties, and no licensing or legal barriers to scratch-building your own radio or modifying one you already own.

This freedom to build, understand, and innovate is core to amateur radio, but has been missing from the commercially available digital voice modes. This is part of why amateur radio digital voice modes have largely stagnated since the 1990s and we're almost wholly dependent on commercial products that aren't well designed for amateur radio users.

M17 is about unlocking the capabilities that amateur radio hardware should already have.

To that end, the M17 Project is a community of open source developers and radio enthusiasts. We're building understandable systems in support of the hackers and experimenters' history of ham radio.

Here you will find people working on radio hardware designs that can be copied and built by anyone, software that anyone has the freedom to modify and share to suit their own needs, and other open systems that respect your freedom to tinker.

Come join the group! We're making ham radio fun.

You can find us on several chat platforms (bridged, so you can pick your favorite), twitter, and on our weekly voice net.