What the International Address Format Builder does
Type the parts of an address once and this tool lays them out in the order the destination country actually uses: the postal code before or after the town as that country writes it, the state line where there is one, the right lines in capitals, and the country as a final line in capitals for international mail. Thirty countries are templated, each following the addressing guidance the Universal Postal Union publishes for it and the destination operator's own rules.
It is a layout helper and says so. It does not check that an address exists, that anyone lives there or that post will arrive - it arranges what you give it the way the sorting office expects to read it, which is the part most senders get wrong.
How to use it
- Choose the destination country first. The field labels change with it: a Dutch address asks for a postcode, an Indian one for a PIN code, and the state field disappears for countries that do not use one.
- Fill in what you have. Empty fields collapse rather than leaving blank lines, and a separator left stranded by an empty field - a hyphen before a missing PIN, for instance - is tidied away.
- Read the postal-code check. It compares what you typed against that country's published pattern, which catches a transposed character or a missing letter, and it says plainly that matching a pattern is not proof the code exists.
- Read the notes under the address. They say why the lines are in that order, which of them are capitalised and what the destination operator asks for.
- Copy the block, or download it as plain text or JSON. Keep the country line for anything crossing a border and drop it for domestic post by unticking the box.
Reading the results
Line order is the substance. The Universal Postal Union's addressing templates put the recipient first and the largest geographic unit last for most countries, but the position of the postal code relative to the town varies: Germany, France and Spain put it before, the United Kingdom and New Zealand after, Brazil and South Africa on a line of its own.
Capitals are not decoration. USPS Publication 28 asks for the entire address in capitals with no punctuation; Royal Mail asks for the post town and postcode in capitals; La Poste asks for the street line and the final town line. The tool applies each country's own rule rather than shouting everything.
A field marked "not used by this country's layout" has been deliberately left out of the block. It is not lost - it is simply not part of an address there, and adding it can slow sorting rather than help it.
Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Russian addresses are shown in Latin script, smallest unit first, which is the reverse of the domestic order. That is the convention for international mail arriving in those countries; a domestic address written in the local script runs the other way.
Worked example: the same address for three countries
A United Kingdom address for Jane Doe at 12 Acacia Avenue in London with the postcode SW1A 1AA comes out as four lines plus the country: the name, the street, LONDON in capitals on its own line, SW1A 1AA below it, and UNITED KINGDOM last. Royal Mail asks for the post town and postcode on separate lines in capitals, with no punctuation.
The same shape for the United States - John Smith, Acme Corp, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington DC 20500-0003 - is written entirely in capitals with the city, the two-letter state and the ZIP Code on one final line, as USPS Publication 28 requires, and UNITED STATES beneath it.
For India the postal code joins the city: A. Sharma, 12 Rajpath, Connaught Place, New Delhi - 110001, then Delhi on the next line and INDIA last. Three countries, three different positions for the same six pieces of information.
Why the country line goes last, in capitals
International post is sorted twice: once in the sending country, which only needs to know where to fly it, and once in the destination country, which needs everything else. Putting the destination country alone on the last line, in capitals, in the language of the sending country, lets the first sorter read one word and stop. It is the one convention that is genuinely universal, and it is why the tool adds it automatically for international mail and drops it when you untick the box for domestic post.
Limitations: what the result does not prove
- This is a layout helper, not address validation. It never checks that a street, town or code exists, and matching a postal-code pattern proves the shape only.
- Thirty countries are templated. For anything not in the list, follow the destination operator's own guidance - the country list is the honest boundary of what is vendored here.
- Operators change their guidance. The templates carry a review date and a link to the source for each country; for a large or high-value mailing, check the operator's current page.
- Addresses in non-Latin scripts are shown in the international Latin-script order. A domestic address written in Japanese, Chinese, Korean or Russian follows the local order and is not produced here.
Privacy: where your data goes
Everything you paste, type or drop is processed in this browser tab. It is not uploaded, logged, stored or sent to analytics. Session recording and tag-manager scripts are switched off on this page.
Standards and sources
- Universal Postal Union - addressing standards (S42) - checked 19 Sep 2026
- ISO 3166 - Codes for the representation of names of countries - checked 19 Sep 2026
- USPS Publication 28 - Postal Addressing Standards
- Canada Post - how to address mail and parcels
- Japan Post - how to write addresses
Frequently asked questions
Where does the postal code go in an international address?
It depends on the country. Germany, France, Spain, Switzerland and most of continental Europe put it before the town on the same line; the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand put it after the town or on its own line; Brazil and South Africa give it a line of its own below the city. Choosing the destination country here applies the right one.
Should an address be written in capitals?
For the United States, yes - Publication 28 asks for the whole address in capitals with no punctuation. Elsewhere it is usually just the post town, the postal code or the final line: Royal Mail wants the post town and postcode in capitals, La Poste the street and town lines. Everywhere, the destination country on the last line is capitalised.
Does this check whether the address is real?
No. It arranges the fields you type and checks the postal code against the country's published pattern, which is a shape test. Confirming that an address exists and receives post needs the destination operator's own address file, which is a licensed product in most countries.
Why is the state field missing for some countries?
Because those countries do not use one in a postal address. Germany, France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom all address post without a regional line, and adding one gives the sorting machinery something extra to read past. The field is hidden rather than left there to tempt you.
How should I write a Japanese address in English?
In the reverse of the Japanese order: recipient, then the block-and-building number, then the ward, then the city and prefecture with the postal code, then JAPAN. Japan Post reads inbound international mail in that order, and this tool lays it out that way.
Do I need the country line for a domestic letter?
No, and it can confuse automated sorting. Untick the international box and the block stops at the last domestic line. The country line matters only when the item crosses a border.
Which countries can this tool format?
Thirty, spanning Europe, North and South America, Asia, Africa and Oceania, each following the guidance published by its own postal operator. The list is in the country picker; anything absent is absent because no template has been reviewed for it, and guessing a layout would be worse than saying so.
Last reviewed by the A2Z.Tools team against the sources listed above.
