ISO 3166-2

ISO 3166-2 is the second part of the ISO 3166 standard. It is a geocode system created for coding the names of subdivisions of countries (subnational entities) and dependent areas. The purpose of the standard is to establish a worldwide series of short abbreviations for places, for use on package labels, containers, and such; anywhere where a short alphanumeric code can serve to clearly indicate a location in a more convenient and less ambiguous form than the full place name. There are around 3700 different codes.

Table of contents

1 Format 2 Changes / Editions 3 Decoding / Encoding lists 4 Format matrix with links to codes 5 Related topics 6 External links

Format

ISO 3166-2 codes consist of two parts, separated by a hyphen. The first part is the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code element, the second is alphabetic or numeric and has one, two or three digits. The second part often is based on national standards.

Changes / Editions

Changes were announced in 6 Newsletters

Decoding / Encoding lists

To find the ISO 3166-2 codes for each country see ISO 3166-1, a list of countries. If you are familiar with the two-letter country codes (similar to internet country codes) you can also use the format matrix given below.

Both ways would lead to articles like ISO 3166-2:XX, where XX stands for the ISO 3166-1 code, e.g. leads to the code list for Australia.

Format matrix with links to codes

Some of the codes are developed by ISO 3166/MA, these are copyrighted. Others are already in use in the specific countries.

length	alpha	numeric	alpha-numeric
constant 1 char	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,	, ,
constant 2 chars	Free: , Partially free: , ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,	Free: Unsorted:
constant 3 chars	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: , , , , , CS, , , , , , , , , , , ,	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: , , , ,
mixed 1,2 chars	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: no system?: , , , 1 for regions, 2 for capital: 1 for capital, 2 for departments: 1 as the general rule, 2 for exceptions	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted:	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted:
mixed 2,3	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted: ?:, , 2 for republics, 3 for cities, regions, districts: 2 for cities, 3 for rayons: 2 for capital, 3 other:		,
mixed 1,3	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted:	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted:	Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted:
mixed 1,2,3			Free: Partially free: ISO - Copyright: Unsorted:,

Related topics

• subnational entity
• list of subnational entities
• list of capitals of subnational entities

External links

• Track changes, sorted by country
• http://www.iso.org/iso/en/prods-services/iso3166ma/04background-on-iso-3166/iso3166-2.html
• http://www.unece.org/cefact/locode/service/sublocat.htm
• This says that it has permission to reproduce all codes. Some codes and names are outdated.
• Uses ISO codes internally in the free geolocation database download
• http://www.mindspring.com/~mjfriedman/countrysubentity.txt

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