The invention relates to a surface acoustic wave transducer in which interfering transverse modes are suppressed by mutually adjusting to each other the transverse excitation profile of the acoustic wave and the basic transverse mode of the waveguide formed by the acoustic track and adjacent external areas. Said adjustment is done by dividing the acoustic track into an excitation range and peripheral ranges, the width of the respective peripheral range corresponding approximately to one quarter of the wavelength of the basic transverse mode, and the wave number of the basic transverse mode in the excitation range amounting to zero. In a preferred further embodiment of the invention, an excitation amplitude which depends on the transverse coordinate and is optimally adjusted to the basic mode can be obtained by dividing the excitation range in a transversal direction into partial tracks that are interconnected in series and/or in parallel.