Reference

Braille Alphabet Reference

The six dot Braille cell and the raised dot patterns that spell the letters A to Z by touch.

At a glance

Key facts

Cell: Six dots, two by three

Numbering: 1 to 3 left, 4 to 6 right

Devised: By Louis Braille, 1824

Standard: Unified English Braille

Text to Braille

Grade 1

Text to Grade 1 Braille7 cells

Type letters A to Z

⠃⠗⠁⠊⠇⠇⠑

These are Unicode Braille patterns, so you can copy them as text. They are a visual representation of the cells, not embossed output.

This is Grade 1, not Grade 2. Grade 1 spells every word letter by letter. Grade 2, which is what most published Braille actually uses, contracts common words and letter groups into single cells and cannot be produced by looking up one letter at a time. Do not use this output where real Grade 2 Braille is required.

Letters A to Z

26 rows

Letters A to Z as raised dots, with the Unicode Braille cell computed from the dot numbers
Letter	Cell	Dots raised	Code point	Unicode name
A	⠁	1	U+2801	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1
B	⠃	1, 2	U+2803	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-12
C	⠉	1, 4	U+2809	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-14
D	⠙	1, 4, 5	U+2819	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-145
E	⠑	1, 5	U+2811	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-15
F	⠋	1, 2, 4	U+280B	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-124
G	⠛	1, 2, 4, 5	U+281B	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1245
H	⠓	1, 2, 5	U+2813	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-125
I	⠊	2, 4	U+280A	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-24
J	⠚	2, 4, 5	U+281A	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-245
K	⠅	1, 3	U+2805	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-13
L	⠇	1, 2, 3	U+2807	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-123
M	⠍	1, 3, 4	U+280D	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-134
N	⠝	1, 3, 4, 5	U+281D	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1345
O	⠕	1, 3, 5	U+2815	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-135
P	⠏	1, 2, 3, 4	U+280F	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1234
Q	⠟	1, 2, 3, 4, 5	U+281F	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-12345
R	⠗	1, 2, 3, 5	U+2817	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1235
S	⠎	2, 3, 4	U+280E	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-234
T	⠞	2, 3, 4, 5	U+281E	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-2345
U	⠥	1, 3, 6	U+2825	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-136
V	⠧	1, 2, 3, 6	U+2827	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1236
W	⠺	2, 4, 5, 6	U+283A	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-2456
X	⠭	1, 3, 4, 6	U+282D	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1346
Y	⠽	1, 3, 4, 5, 6	U+283D	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-13456
Z	⠵	1, 3, 5, 6	U+2835	BRAILLE PATTERN DOTS-1356

Source: Unified English Braille, International Council on English Braille. This table has not been re-verified against the primary source; see the methodology for what that means and how to report a correction. Also drawn on: Unicode Braille Patterns block, U+2800 to U+28FF. 26 letters, dataset version 1.1.0. Changelog and JSON.

Where it comes from

Braille was devised by Louis Braille in 1824, while he was a teenage student at the Royal Institute for Blind Youth in Paris. He built on a military night writing system and reduced it to a compact cell of six dots that a fingertip can read in one touch. The system spread worldwide and, for English, is now standardized as Unified English Braille, maintained by the International Council on English Braille, so the same patterns are taught and printed consistently across countries.

How to use it

Every character sits in a cell of six dot positions, numbered 1 to 3 down the left column and 4 to 6 down the right. A pattern is written as the list of raised dots, so the letter C, which raises the top two dots, is dots 1 and 4. The first ten letters, A to J, use only the top four positions. The next ten, K to T, repeat those shapes with dot 3 added, and U, V, X, Y, Z add dot 6 as well (W is a later addition and breaks the pattern). Learning the first ten shapes therefore unlocks most of the alphabet.

This page is a standing reference at a fixed URL, built to be linked and cited. The data here is compiled from Unified English Braille, the standard maintained by the International Council on English Braille.