Suicides account for 2000 deaths in Chile each year. With a suicide rate of 11.3, it is classified as a country with high suicide risk. Aims: to identify personality and cognitive characteristics of the group of Chilean suicides that left suicide notes, through a content analysis. Methods: descriptive field study with an ex post facto design. All suicides registered between 2010 and 2012 by the Investigations Police of Chile were analyzed, obtaining 203 suicide notes from 96 cases. The Darbonne categories for content analysis were used with the inter-judge method. Results: The mean age of the suicides was 44.2 (SD = 18.53). Most of the notes were addressed to family members (51.7%). The most expressed reasons were marital- or interpersonal-related (24.6%); another 23.6% expressed a lack of purpose or hopelessness (including depression, wish to die, low self-esteem). The most frequent content expressed were instructions (about money, children, and funeral). All of the notes showed logical thinking and were written with coherence and clarity. Notably 42% of the notes were marked by affections of fondness, love or dependence of others. Regarding attitudes, the most common were of escape or farewell (42.4%), followed by fatalism, hopelessness, frustration or tiredness (40%). 24 statistically significant differences were found throughout the categories of analysis, according to cohorts of age, marital status and sex. Conclusions: the findings contribute to the profiling of Chilean suicides and to the implementation of suicide prevention programs. Keywords: suicide notes; content analysis; suicide; Chile. Resumen: En Chile anualmente mueren alrededor de 2000 personas por suicidio. Con 11.3 suicidios por cada 100 000 habitantes se ubica como país de alto riesgo. El 2012 el 7.7% de las muertes tuvo una causa violenta: 1841 suicidios y 687 homicidios. Sin duda, este alarmante incremento de suicidios requiere de investigación especializada, sin embargo, los estudios con metodologías cualitativas reportados en Latinoamérica son escasos. Objetivo: identificar rasgos de personalidad y características cognoscitivas de los suicidas de Chile a través de las notas suicidas. Método: estudio de campo, correlacional y expost facto. Se analizaron todos los casos de suicidio registrados de 2010 a 2012, localizándose 203 notas de 96 suicidas. Se aplicó la guía de Categorías de Darbonne para el análisis de contenido con el método de interjueces y se obtuvo un nivel de concordancia de 93%. Resultados: se encontraron 24 diferencias estadísticamente significativas, contrastando tres variables (sexo, edad y estado civil) que muestran la compleja estructuración de la sociedad chilena, tanto en fortalecimiento general como en vulnerabilidad de ciertos grupos. Conclusión: los resultados coadyuvan para crear el perfil del suicida chileno y la implementación de programas efectivos de prevención y atención al comportamiento suicida. Deberán realizarse estudios comparativos internacionales. Palabras Clave: Notas Suicidas, Análisis de contenido, Suicidio, Chile.