European Braille Systems
Major European Braille Codes
- Script / Language Covered: English (US, UK, Canada, Australia, NZ)
- Key Features / Variants: Single unified code for literary and technical material
- Status: Current standard
- Script / Language Covered: French, Haitian Creole, many West-African languages
- Key Features / Variants: Basis for many African Braille codes
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: German, Luxembourgish
- Key Features / Variants: Includes special signs for ß, umlauts
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: Spanish (Spain, Latin America)
- Key Features / Variants: Uses “ñ” and accented vowels
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: Portuguese (Portugal, Brazil)
- Key Features / Variants: Slight differences between PT-BR and PT-PT
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: Italian
- Key Features / Variants: Includes “à, è, ì, ò, ù”
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: Dutch, Flemish
- Key Features / Variants: Uses “ij” digraph
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: Swedish, Finnish, Sami languages
- Key Features / Variants: Separate codes for Å, Ä, Ö
- Status: Active
- Script / Language Covered: Modern Greek
- Key Features / Variants: Based on International Braille with Greek letters
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Russian, Belarusian, Ukrainian (Cyrillic)
- Key Characteristics: Based on Cyrillic alphabet; some patterns borrowed from French Braille. 33-cell alphabet
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Polish
- Key Characteristics: Handles diacritics (ą, ć, ę, ł, ń, ó, ś, ż, ź)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Czech, Slovak
- Key Characteristics: Similar to Polish but with own diacritic mapping
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Hungarian
- Key Characteristics: Uses physical symmetry of patterns iconically. Includes ő, ú, í, é, á, ó, ö, ü
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Romanian
- Key Characteristics: Includes special characters for Romanian diacritics
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Albanian
- Key Characteristics: Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Catalan
- Key Characteristics: Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Estonian
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Faroese
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Icelandic
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Irish (Gaeilge)
- Key Characteristics: Adapted for Gaelic orthography. Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Latvian
- Key Characteristics: Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Lithuanian
- Key Characteristics: Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Maltese
- Key Characteristics: Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Norwegian
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille (Scandinavian)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Slovak
- Key Characteristics: Similar to Czech but with own diacritic mapping
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Welsh
- Key Characteristics: Includes special characters for Welsh. Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Former Yugoslav languages (Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, etc.)
- Key Characteristics: Based on French-ordered Braille
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Danish
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille (Scandinavian)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Greenlandic (Kalaallisut)
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille (Scandinavian)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Northern Sámi
- Key Characteristics: Nordic family Braille (Scandinavian)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Bulgarian
- Key Characteristics: Russian lineage family (Cyrillic-mediated)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Tatar
- Key Characteristics: Russian lineage family (Cyrillic-mediated)
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Ukrainian
- Key Characteristics: Russian lineage family (Cyrillic-mediated); 33-cell alphabet
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Belarusian
- Key Characteristics: Russian lineage family (Cyrillic-mediated); 33-cell alphabet
- Status: Active
- Languages Supported: Luxembourgish
- Key Characteristics: Extended to 8-dot system
- Status: Active