The ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 standard assigns every country a readable three-letter
code, such as GBR or USA. These are the codes printed in machine-readable
passports and used across banking, international sport, and large datasets. This
tool finds the alpha-3 code for any country and shows the related alpha-2 and
numeric forms.
How it works
ISO 3166-1 defines three codes per country. The alpha-3 code is favoured where
human readability matters because three letters carry more meaning than two:
FRA clearly reads as France, and DEU reflects Germany’s local name,
Deutschland. A few are non-obvious, like CHE for Switzerland, derived from the
Latin Confoederatio Helvetica, which is exactly why a lookup helps. The tool
matches your text against both the alpha-3 code and the country name.
The three ISO 3166-1 code types at a glance
Every country in ISO 3166-1 has three separate identifiers that serve different purposes:
| Format | Example (United Kingdom) | Example (Germany) | Typical use |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alpha-2 (2 letters) | GB | DE | ccTLDs (.gb, .de), HTML lang attribute, ISO 4217 currency prefix |
| Alpha-3 (3 letters) | GBR | DEU | Passports, IOC sport codes, World Bank data, banking |
| Numeric (3 digits) | 826 | 276 | UN stats, legacy mainframe systems, barcode country prefixes |
All three identify the same country, but they are not interchangeable in a system that expects a specific format.
Why some alpha-3 codes are counter-intuitive
Most codes derive straightforwardly from the English name, but several do not:
| Alpha-3 | Country | Why it looks odd |
|---|---|---|
| CHE | Switzerland | From Latin Confoederatio Helvetica |
| DEU | Germany | From German Deutschland |
| GRC | Greece | From Greek Hellas via Latin Graecia |
| NLD | Netherlands | From Dutch Nederland |
| ESP | Spain | From Spanish España |
| PRT | Portugal | From Portuguese Portugal (internally consistent but PRT not POT) |
| PHL | Philippines | Avoids conflict with other P codes |
For any code that feels wrong, a quick lookup in this tool resolves ambiguity instantly.
Where alpha-3 codes appear in practice
Passports and travel documents. The machine-readable zone on every ICAO-compliant passport uses the alpha-3 code in positions 3–5 of line 1. GBR for a British passport, USA for an American one. Border control scanners read this code to identify the issuing country.
Olympic and international sport. The International Olympic Committee uses three-letter codes for national delegations — almost always matching ISO 3166-1 alpha-3, though with a handful of historical exceptions. If you are building a sports dataset, verify each code against both the IOC and ISO lists.
Banking and financial messaging. SWIFT/BIC bank codes embed the country as an alpha-2 pair, but many reporting standards and regulatory filings (particularly in the EU and World Bank systems) require alpha-3. Knowing both and being able to convert between them is routine in financial data work.
Databases and APIs. Many open government datasets key country rows on alpha-3. The World Bank, IMF, and WHO all publish data with alpha-3 country keys. When joining datasets from different sources, verifying that both use the same code format prevents silent mismatches.
Tips and examples
To find a code, type the country name — searching Switzerland returns the non-obvious CHE. To verify a code you already have, type it, such as KOR, to confirm it is South Korea and not North Korea (PRK). The numeric code shown alongside is useful for cross-referencing with UN statistical databases or any system that predates two- and three-letter codes.