What Does SOS Stand For?

SOS doesn't stand for anything. "Save Our Souls" and "Save Our Ship" are both backronyms invented after the fact to make the letters memorable — neither phrase appears anywhere in the actual 1906 international agreement that adopted the signal.

Why SOS Was Actually Chosen

SOS in Morse code is three dots, three dashes, three dots, sent as one unbroken signal with no gaps between the groups — that continuous, symmetrical rhythm is what made it the pick at the 1906 Berlin International Radiotelegraph Convention, not the letters themselves. It's short, easy to send quickly and repeatedly, and nearly impossible to mistake for anything else, even through heavy static or a weak signal.

It Replaced a Patchwork of Competing Signals

Before SOS, different companies and countries used different, incompatible distress signals — most notably Marconi's own CQD. The full story of how SOS won out, and how the Titanic ended up sending both signals in 1912, is covered in why SOS became the distress signal.

Is SOS Still Used?

It stopped being the mandatory maritime distress signal in 1999, when satellite-based GMDSS took over, but it's still internationally recognized as a distress signal in any form — including light and sound signals — and remains one of the most widely known patterns in the world.

Amateur radio operators, outdoor survivalists and search-and-rescue guidance still treat SOS as a universally understood emergency signal, precisely because it never needed the letters to mean anything in the first place — the pattern itself has always done all the work, which is exactly why it reads the same right-side-up or upside-down when stamped out in snow or sand for a rescue aircraft passing overhead to spot.