MAILING ADDRESS FORMAT BY COUNTRY

Mailing addresses are formatted differently depending on the country. Sometimes the handwritten format may even differ from the printed format due to the increasing popularity of machine-readable text.

Contents

United States

Residential

Business

Italy

United Kingdom

Japan

Russia, Belarus

United States

Residential

Handwritten	Post Office Standard
John D. Smith100 Maiden Lane, Apt 3FRoswell, New Mexico 12345	JOHN D SMITH 100 MAIDEN LN APT 3F ROSWELL NM 12345-0001
Thomas K. Jensen29 West 75th Street, Apt 5New York, New York 10010	THOMAS K JENSEN 29 W 75 ST APT 5 NEW YORK NY 10010
Ashinc MillerP.O. Box 947Keene, NH 03431	ASHINC MILLER PO BOX 947 KEENE NH 03431-0947

Format Variations:
:1. Only the USPS can deliver to a P.O. Box. For this reason the recipient may choose to insert her physical (aka street) address as line two, expanding the complete address to four lines. Providing both allows a sender to ship via the USPS or via a private carrier.
:2. An apartment number can also be written on a separate line. The word, apartment, is rarely written out.
:3. The state, geographical sub-section, i.e.: west, and type of street, i.e.: lane, is often abbreviated as shown in the PO standard. A period may follow after an abbreviated street type.

Business

Handwritten	Post Office Standard
Sarah K. BrownSuper Enterprises, Inc.200 Business DriveHonolulu, Hawaii 22123	SARAH K BROWN SUPER ENTERPRISES INC 200 BUSINESS DR HONOLULU HI 22123-0001

Italy

An internal address, in Italy, must be composed of three to five rows.

Up to six rows can be used if the mail is sent abroad.

1st row: addressee

2nd row: optional - additional information about the addressee

3rd row: optional - additional information about the building (building number, floor, apartment number)

4th row: street name and number (via/viale/corso/piazza...)(or CASELLA POSTALE (P.O.Box number))

5th row: PostCode Town (Province abbreviation)

6th row: Foreign State name



Sig. Giuseppe Rossi

''Studio medico Rossi''

''Scala A piano 7 interno 6''

via dei Gonzi, 15

00123 Roma (RM)



Line ordering cannot be changed

United Kingdom

Japan

Main articles: Japanese addressing system

Russia, Belarus

Russia, Belarus, and some other post-Soviet countries have retained the address format used in the USSR. In domestic mail, the address starts with the city name, followed by street name, building number, apartment number (if any), and the addressee's name. Many pre-printed envelopes have a special field for entering the postal code, or if lacking that, it can be written before the city name.

Cyrillic	Transliteration	Translation
Беларусь 213800 г. Бобруйск Могилевской обл. ул. Сусанина, д. 23, кв. 34 И.И.Иванов	Belarus 213800 g. Bobruisk, Mogilevskoy obl., ul. Susanina, d. 23, kv. 34 I.I. Ivanov	I.I. Ivanov 23 Susanin St, Apt. 34 Babruysk, Mahilyow Voblast, 213800 Belarus

Some neighborhoods may be planned in such a way that some, or most, apartment buildings don't face a named street. In this case, a number of expedients can be used. In older neighborhoods, such as the historical center of Moscow, a "main" building may have the same number as one or more "subsidiary" buildings accessible via driveways behind the main building. They will be addressed as e.g. ''ul. Lenina, d. 123'', i.e. ''123 Lenin St'') An address may also cover one or more ''subsidiary buildings'' behind the main building, addressed as ''ul. Lenina, d. 123, str. 2'' (''123 Lenin St, unit 2'', where ''str.'' (abbreviation for строение, ''stroenie'') means a '(subsidiary) building'. In newer areas with more regular street plans, apartment buildings that don't face a named street may be designated with Cyrillic letters appended to the building number, e.g. ''123-а'', ''123-б'', etc., in alphabetic order.
In some ''microraion'' neighborhoods, with few, if any, buildings facing named streets, the name (or more likely number of the ''microraion'' (planned housing development)) would be used instead of the street name; thus someone may live at ''4-th microrayon, d. 123, kv. 56'', i.e. ''123 - 4th Microraion, apt. 56''.