ISO 3166-1 was first published by the International Organization for Standardization in ISO 3166 in 1974. ISO 3166-2 and ISO 3166-3 were adopted at a latter date.
ISO 3166 is not the only standard for country codes. See country codes for discussion of the various systems that exist.
Starting in the mid-1980s, the two-letter codes have been used in domain names on the Internet, where they are used to form country code ccTLDs.
The two-letter ISO 3166 codes form the first two letters of the three-letter ISO 4217 standard codes for currencies.
They are also used for International Bank Account Numbers, the [ISO 6166]? International securities identification numbering (ISIN) system, [ISO 7372]?, [ISO 9375]?, the ISO/IEC 7501-1 machine readable travel documents standard, UN/LOCODE (United Nations Economic Commission for Europe Recommendation 16, for encoding names of ports), and WIPO standard ST.3 (for encoding country which issued a patent or trademark).
Note that AA, ZZ and the ranges QM-QZ and XA-XZ are reserved for private use. In addition, OO is designated as an escape code. If a country code cannot be found in the list then it is probably obsolete, in which case it should be found in the list of obsolete country codes, further below.
The following is intended to be a complete list of current ISO 3166 two-letter codes.
AD - Andorra AE - United Arab Emirates AF - Afghanistan AG - Antigua and Barbuda AI - Anguilla (AI previously represented French Afars and Issas) AL - Albania AM - Armenia AN - Netherlands Antilles AO - Angola AQ - Antarctica (defined here as everything south of latitude 60°S) AR - Argentina AS - American Samoa AT - Austria AU - Australia (including Ashmore and Cartier Islands and Coral Sea Islands) AW - Aruba AZ - Azerbaijan
BA - Bosnia and Herzegovina BB - Barbados BD - Bangladesh BE - Belgium BF - Burkina Faso BG - Bulgaria BH - Bahrain BI - Burundi BJ - Benin BM - Bermuda BN - Brunei Darussalam BO - Bolivia BR - Brazil BS - Bahamas BT - Bhutan BV - Bouvet Island BW - Botswana BY - Belarus BZ - Belize
CA - Canada CC - Cocos (Keeling) Islands CD - Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire) CF - Central African Republic CG - Republic of the Congo CH - Switzerland (Confoederatio Helvetica) CI - Côte d'Ivoire, a.k.a. Ivory Coast CK - Cook Islands CL - Chile CM - Cameroon CN - China CO - Colombia CR - Costa Rica CU - Cuba CV - Cape Verde CX - Christmas Island CY - Cyprus CZ - Czech Republic
DE - Germany (Deutschland) DJ - Djibouti DK - Denmark DM - Dominica DO - Dominican Republic DZ - Algeria
EC - Ecuador EE - Estonia EG - Egypt EH - Western Sahara ER - Eritrea ES - Spain (España) ET - Ethiopia
FI - Finland FJ - Fiji FK - Falkland Islands FM - Federated States of Micronesia FO - Faroe Islands FR - France
GA - Gabon GB - United Kingdom (with Isle of Man and Channel Islands) GD - Grenada GE - Georgia (GE previously represented the Gilbert and Ellis Islands) GF - French Guiana GH - Ghana GI - Gibraltar GL - Greenland GM - Gambia GN - Guinea GP - Guadeloupe GQ - Equatorial Guinea GR - Greece GS - South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands GT - Guatemala GU - Guam GW - Guinea-Bissau GY - Guyana
HK - Hong Kong HM - Heard Island and McDonald Islands HN - Honduras HR - Croatia (Hrvatska) HT - Haiti HU - Hungary
ID - Indonesia IE - Ireland IL - Israel IN - India IO - British Indian Ocean Territory IQ - Iraq IR - Iran IS - Iceland IT - Italy
JM - Jamaica JO - Jordan JP - Japan
KE - Kenya KG - Kyrgyzstan KH - Cambodia KI - Kiribati KM - Comoros KN - Saint Kitts and Nevis KP - North Korea KR - South Korea KW - Kuwait KY - Cayman Islands KZ - Kazakhstan
LA - Laos LB - Lebanon LC - Saint Lucia LI - Liechtenstein LK - Sri Lanka LR - Liberia LS - Lesotho LT - Lithuania LU - Luxembourg LV - Latvia LY - Libya
MA - Morocco MC - Monaco MD - Moldova MG - Madagascar MH - Marshall Islands MK - Macedonia ML - Mali MM - Myanmar MN - Mongolia MO - Macau MP - Northern Mariana Islands MQ - Martinique MR - Mauritania MS - Montserrat MT - Malta MU - Mauritius MV - Maldives MW - Malawi MX - Mexico MY - Malaysia MZ - Mozambique
NA - Namibia NC - New Caledonia NE - Niger NF - Norfolk Island NG - Nigeria NI - Nicaragua NL - Netherlands NO - Norway NP - Nepal NR - Nauru NU - Niue NZ - New Zealand
OM - Oman
PA - Panama PE - Peru PF - French Polynesia (with Clipperton Island) PG - Papua New Guinea PH - Philippines
PK - Pakistan PL - Poland PM - Saint Pierre and Miquelon PN - Pitcairn Islands PR - Puerto Rico PS - Occupied Palestinian Territories (i.e., West Bank and Gaza Strip) PT - Portugal PW - Palau PY - Paraguay
QA - Qatar
RE - Reunion RO - Romania RU - Russia RW - Rwanda
SA - Saudi Arabia SB - Solomon Islands SC - Seychelles SD - Sudan SE - Sweden SG - Singapore SH - Saint Helena (including Ascension Island and other dependencies) SI - Slovenia SJ - Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands SK - Slovakia (SK previously represented Sikkim) SL - Sierra Leone SM - San Marino SN - Senegal SO - Somalia SR - Suriname ST - Sao Tome and Principe SV - El Salvador SY - Syria SZ - Swaziland
TC - Turks and Caicos Islands TD - Chad TF - French Southern and Antarctic Lands TG - Togo TH - Thailand TJ - Tajikistan TK - Tokelau TM - Turkmenistan TN - Tunisia TO - Tonga TP - East Timor TR - Turkey TT - Trinidad and Tobago TV - Tuvalu TW - Taiwan TZ - Tanzania
UA - Ukraine UG - Uganda UM - United States Minor Outlying Islands US - United States of America UY - Uruguay UZ - Uzbekistan
VA - Vatican City State VC - Saint Vincent and the Grenadines VE - Venezuela VG - British Virgin Islands VI - U.S. Virgin Islands VN - Vietnam VU - Vanuatu
WF - Wallis and Futuna WS - Samoa (formerly Western Samoa)
YE - Yemen YT - Mayotte YU - Yugoslavia (that is, Serbia and Montenegro)
ZA - South Africa ZM - Zambia ZW - Zimbabwe
Reserved code elements are codes which, while not ISO 3166 codes, are in use for some applications in conjunction with the ISO 3166 codes. The ISO 3166 MA therefore reserves them, so that they are not used for new official ISO 3166 codes, thereby creating conflicts between the standard and those applications. The alpha-2 reserved code elements list, as of 2001-02-13, is as follows.
A transitional reservation refers to a code which was formerly present in ISO 3166, but which since has been deleted. It will be maintained as a transitional reservation for at least five years, for the sake of users who still need to refer to the former entity or whose systems have not yet been updated to refer to the new code. The transitionally reserved alpha-2 code elements are:
The indeterminately reserved alpha-2 code elements are code elements used to identify vehicles under the 1949 and 1968 United Nations Road Traffic Conventions. These codes differ from those used in ISO 3166. The ISO 3166 MA hopes that these codes will eventually be phased out and that ISO 3166 codes will be used instead; but in the meantime they are reserved, to avoid conflicts between ISO 3166 and the Conventions, and to facilitate any transition from the Convention codes to ISO 3166 codes. These codes are as follows:
Notes:
1. code notified to United Nations Secretary-General under 1949 and/or 1968 Road Traffic Conventions
2. code in use for road transport purposes, but not notified to United Nations Secretary-General under 1949 Road Traffic Convention
3. code under 1949 Road Traffic Convention
4. code under 1968 Road Traffic Convention
5. this code is in use to refer to both Bolivia and Botswana
Exceptionally reserved alpha-2 code elements are reserved permanently because they are needed for particular purposes. ISO 3166 MA only authorizes their use for the particular purpose for which they were established. The list is as follows:
In addition, the ISO 3166 MA has undertaken, for the time being, not to use the following alpha-2 codes from WIPO Standard ST.3. However, this undertaking is not classified as an transitional, indeterminate or transitional reservation, since the codes do not refer to countries, dependent areas or other geographic regions or localities:
In addition, WIPO Standard ST.3 also uses EA to code the Eurasian Patent Organization. However, ISO 3166 MA has stated it cannot guarantee to reserve the code EA from use, since it is already used for customs purposes to represent Ceuta and Melilla. ISO 3166 MA proposed in 1995 that EV be used by WIPO for the purpose of representing the Eurasian Patent Organization; however, this request was not honoured by WIPO.
The following alpha-3 codes currently exist in the ISO 3166 standard:
The following alpha-3 codes are subject to a transitional reservation:
The following three letter codes are subject to an indeterminate reservation, having been notified to the United Nations Secretary-General under the 1949 and/or 1968 Road Transport Conventions:
The following alpha-3 code elements are subject to an exceptional reservation:
For the time being, ISO 3166 MA has agreed not to use the following codes, taken from ISO/IEC 7501-1 (Machine readable travel documents), as alpha-3 country codes:
The following is a list of obsolete ISO 3166 two-letter country codes, included here for reference. Note that many of these codes were withdrawn before the introduction of the Domain Name System, and so were never used as top-level domains. For each code, the year of withdrawal is given in parentheses. Once five years have passed from the time of withdrawal the code is free to be reallocated, as has been done with AI, GE and SK.
| AI | (1977) French Territory of the Afars and the Issas. Replaced by DJ (for Djibouti). Note that AI has since been reassigned to Anguilla. |
| BQ | (1979) British Antarctic Territory. Now covered by AQ (Antarctica). |
| BU | (1989) Burma. Replaced by MM (for Myanmar). |
| CS | (1993) Czechoslovakia. Replaced by CZ and SK. |
| CT | (1984) Canton and Enderbury Islands. Now covered by KI (Kiribati). |
| DD | (1990) East Germany. Now covered by DE (Germany). |
| DY | (1977) Dahomey. Replaced by BJ (for Benin). |
| FQ | (1979) French Southern and Antarctic Territories. Now covered by AQ and TF. |
| FX | (1997) Metropolitan France. Covered by FR (France). |
| GE | (1979) Gilbert and Ellis Islands. Now covered by KI (Kiribati) and TV (Tuvalu). Note that GE has since been reassigned to Georgia. |
| HV | (1984) Upper Volta (Haute-Volta). Replaced by BF (for Burkina Faso). |
| JT | (1986) Johnston Island. Now covered by UM. |
| MI | (1986) Midway Islands. Now covered by UM. |
| NH | (1980) New Hebrides. Replaced by VU (for Vanuatu). |
| NQ | (1983) Dronning Maud Land. Now covered by AQ (Antarctica). |
| NT | (1993) Neutral Zone between Saudi Arabia (SA) and Iraq (IQ). |
| PC | (1986) Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. Replaced by FM, MH, MP and PW. |
| PU | (1986) U.S. Miscellaneous Pacific Islands. Now covered by UM. |
| PZ | (1980) Panama Canal Zone. Now covered by PA (Panama). |
| RH | (1980) Rhodesia. Replaced by ZW (for Zimbabwe). |
| SK | (1975) Sikkim. Now covered by IN (India). Note that SK has since been reassigned to Slovakia. |
| SU | (1992) Soviet Union. Replaced by AM, AZ, BY, EE, GE, KG, KZ, LT, LV, MD, RU, TJ, TM, UA and UZ (of which BY and UA already existed). SU is still in use as a top-level domain. |
| VD | (1977) Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Now covered by VN (Vietnam). |
| WK | (1986) Wake Island. Now covered by UM. |
| YD | (1990) South Yemen. Now covered by YE (Yemen). |
| ZR | (1997) Zaire. Replaced by CD (for Democratic Republic of the Congo). |
External links:
Sources: Information on reserved codes taken from "Reserved code elements under ISO 3166-1" published by Secretariat of ISO/TC 46, ISO 3166 Maintenance Agency, 2001-02-13, available on request from ISO 3166 MA.
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