European Article Number
Encyclopedia
Barcode
A barcode is an optical machine-readable representation of data, which shows data about the object to which it attaches. Originally barcodes represented data by varying the widths and spacings of parallel lines, and may be referred to as linear or 1 dimensional . Later they evolved into rectangles,...
standard which is a superset
SuperSet
SuperSet Software was a group founded by friends and former Eyring Research Institute co-workers Drew Major, Dale Neibaur, Kyle Powell and later joined by Mark Hurst...
of the original 12-digit Universal Product Code
Universal Product Code
The Universal Product Code is a barcode symbology , that is widely used in North America, and in countries including the UK, Australia, and New Zealand for tracking trade items in stores. Its most common form, the UPC-A, consists of 12 numerical digits, which are uniquely assigned to each trade item...
(UPC) system developed in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. The EAN-13 barcode is defined by the standards organization GS1
GS1
Founded in 1977, GS1 is an international not-for-profit association dedicated to the development and implementation of global standards and solutions to improve the efficiency and visibility of supply and demand chains globally and across multiple sectors...
.
The EAN-13 barcodes are used worldwide for marking products often sold at retail point of sale. The numbers encoded in EAN-13 bar codes are product identification numbers, which are also called Japanese Article Number (JAN) in Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
. All the numbers encoded in UPC and EAN barcodes are known as Global Trade Item Number
Global Trade Item Number
Global Trade Item Number is an identifier for trade items developed by GS1...
s (GTIN), and they can be encoded in other GS1 barcode
Barcode
A barcode is an optical machine-readable representation of data, which shows data about the object to which it attaches. Originally barcodes represented data by varying the widths and spacings of parallel lines, and may be referred to as linear or 1 dimensional . Later they evolved into rectangles,...
s.
The less commonly used EAN-8
EAN 8
An EAN-8 is a barcode and is derived from the longer European Article Number code. It was introduced for use on small packages where an EAN-13 barcode would be too large; for example on cigarettes, pencils , and chewing gum packets.EAN-8 barcodes may be used to encode GTIN-8s which are another set...
barcodes are used also for marking retail goods; however, they are usually reserved for smaller items, for example confectionery
Confectionery
Confectionery is the set of food items that are rich in sugar, any one or type of which is called a confection. Modern usage may include substances rich in artificial sweeteners as well...
.
2-digit (EAN 2
EAN 2
The EAN-2 is a supplement to the EAN-13 and UPC-A barcodes. It is often used on magazines and periodicals to indicate an issue number.-Encoding:The Encoding of EAN-2 characters is very similar to that of the other European Article Numbers. The only difference is that the digits are separated by 01...
) and 5-digit (EAN 5
EAN 5
The EAN-5 is a supplement to the EAN-13 barcode used on books. It is used to give a suggestion for the price of the book.ISBN Encoding – Country and Currency Values Description-Encoding:...
) supplemental barcodes may be added for a total of 14 or 17 data digits. These are generally used for periodicals (to indicate the serial number), or books and weighed products like food (to indicate the selling price), respectively.
Components
The GTIN-13 encoded in the bar code has four components:- The GS1 Prefix, the first three digits, usually identifying the national GS1 Member Organization to which the manufacturer is registered (not necessarily where the product is actually made). When the EAN-13 symbol encodes a conversion of an ISBN, the GS1 Prefix will be either 978 or 979. Likewise the prefix will be 979 for ISMNs (whose prefix is shared with ISBN) and 977 for ISSNs.
- The Company number, consisting of three to eight digits depending on number of GTIN-13s required by the manufacturer to identify different product lines (in ISBN and ISSN, this component is used to identify the language in which the publication was issued and managed by a transnational agency covering several countries, or to identify the country where the legal deposits are made by a publisher registered with a national agency, and it is further subdivided any allocating subblocks for publishers; many countries have several prefixes allocated in the ISSN and ISBN registries).
- The Item reference, consisting of two to six digits (in ISBN and ISSN, it uniquely identifies the publication from the same publisher; it should be used and allocated by the registered publisher in order to avoid creating gaps; however it happens that a registered book or serial never gets published and sold).
- The Check digit, a single checksumChecksumA checksum or hash sum is a fixed-size datum computed from an arbitrary block of digital data for the purpose of detecting accidental errors that may have been introduced during its transmission or storage. The integrity of the data can be checked at any later time by recomputing the checksum and...
digit. The check digit is computed modulo 10, where the weights in the checksum calculation alternate 3 and 1. In particular, since the weights are relatively prime to 10 the EAN system will detect all single digit errors. But, since the difference of consecutive weights is even, the EAN system does not detect all adjacent transposition errors.
The complete number is used as a reference key to look up information about the product line held on a database; the number is never normally broken down into its components within users' systems.
GS1 Prefixes
The first two or three digits of the GTIN of any product identify the GS1 Member Organization which the manufacturer has joined. Note that EAN-13 codes beginning with 0 are rarely seen, as this is just a longer form of a 12-digit UPC and is represented by the same barcode.The 200-299 country code is worth a special mention; most GS1 member organizations define this as being available for retailer internal use (or internal use by other types of business). Some retailers use this for proprietary (own brand or unbranded) products (although many retailers obtain their own manufacturer's code for their own brands); some retailers use at least part of this prefix for products which are packaged in store, for example, items weighed and served over a counter for a customer. The barcode may encode a price, quantity or weight along with a product identifier (in a retailer defined way); the product identifier may be one assigned by the Produce Electronic Identification Board or may be retailer assigned. Retailers who have historically used UPC barcodes will tend to use GS1 prefixes 04 (for products) and 02 (for store packaged products) in a similar way.
Calculation of checksum digit
The checksum digit must be calculated from the data digits before it can be encoded.The checksum is calculated taking a varying weight value times the value of each number in the barcode to make a sum. The checksum digit is then the digit which must be added to this sum to get a number evenly divisible by 10 (i.e. the additive inverse of the sum, modulo 10).
Weight
The weight for a specific position in the EAN code is either 3 or 1, which alternate so that the final data digit has a weight of 3; the same algorithm is used in other GTINsGlobal Trade Item Number
Global Trade Item Number is an identifier for trade items developed by GS1...
and the Serial Shipping Container Code
Serial Shipping Container Code
The serial shipping container code is an 18-digit number used to identify logistics units. The SSCC is encoded in a barcode, generally GS1-128, and used in electronic commerce transactions....
(SSCC). In an EAN-13 code, the weight is 3 for even positions and 1 for odd positions; this is reversed in EAN-8 codes. All GTIN and SSCC codes get their weight values for the position of the code from this table, making their code line up to the right:
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 |
| 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 |
Weights for EAN-13 code:
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
| 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 |
For example: 4006381333931 (Stabilo Point 88 Art. No. 88/57), the check code is:
| First 12 digits of the barcode | 4 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 3 | 8 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 3 |
| Weights | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 |
| Multiplied by weight | 4 | 0 | 0 | 18 | 9 | 24 | 1 | 9 | 3 | 9 | 9 | 9 |
| Sum | 89 |
The nearest multiple of 10 that is equal or higher than the sum, is 90. Subtract them: 90 - 89 = 1, this is the last digit of the barcode.
Calculation
Taking the numbers from an EAN 8EAN 8
An EAN-8 is a barcode and is derived from the longer European Article Number code. It was introduced for use on small packages where an EAN-13 barcode would be too large; for example on cigarettes, pencils , and chewing gum packets.EAN-8 barcodes may be used to encode GTIN-8s which are another set...
code we get: 7351353 or in the table:
| Position | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 |
| Weight | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 |
| Code | 7 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 3 | ||||||||||
| Sums | 21 | 3 | 15 | 1 | 9 | 5 | 9 |
The sum from this barcode is then: 63
63 modulo
Modulo
In the mathematical community, the word modulo is often used informally. Generally, to say "A is the same as B modulo C" means, more-or-less, "A and B are the same except for differences accounted for or explained by C"....
10 = 3
10 minus 3 makes the checksum = 7
The complete EAN 8
EAN 8
An EAN-8 is a barcode and is derived from the longer European Article Number code. It was introduced for use on small packages where an EAN-13 barcode would be too large; for example on cigarettes, pencils , and chewing gum packets.EAN-8 barcodes may be used to encode GTIN-8s which are another set...
code is then: 73513537
Binary encoding of data digits into EAN-13 barcode
To encode an EAN-13 barcode, the digits are first split into 3 groups; the first digit, the first group of 6 and the last group of 6. The first group of six is encoded using a scheme whereby each digit has two possible encodings, one of which has even parity and one of which has odd parity. The first digit is encoded by selecting a pattern of choices between these two encodings for the next six digits, according to the table below. (Unlike the other digits, the first digit is not represented directly by a pattern of bars.) All digits in the last group of six digits are encoded using a single set of patterns which are the same patterns used for UPC.If the first digit is zero, all digits in the first group of six are encoded using the patterns used for UPC, therefore, a UPC barcode is also an EAN-13 barcode with the first digit set to zero.
| First digit | First group of 6 digits | Last group of 6 digits |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | LLLLLL | RRRRRR |
| 1 | LLGLGG | RRRRRR |
| 2 | LLGGLG | RRRRRR |
| 3 | LLGGGL | RRRRRR |
| 4 | LGLLGG | RRRRRR |
| 5 | LGGLLG | RRRRRR |
| 6 | LGGGLL | RRRRRR |
| 7 | LGLGLG | RRRRRR |
| 8 | LGLGGL | RRRRRR |
| 9 | LGGLGL | RRRRRR |
| Digit | L-code | G-code | R-code |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0001101 | 0100111 | 1110010 |
| 1 | 0011001 | 0110011 | 1100110 |
| 2 | 0010011 | 0011011 | 1101100 |
| 3 | 0111101 | 0100001 | 1000010 |
| 4 | 0100011 | 0011101 | 1011100 |
| 5 | 0110001 | 0111001 | 1001110 |
| 6 | 0101111 | 0000101 | 1010000 |
| 7 | 0111011 | 0010001 | 1000100 |
| 8 | 0110111 | 0001001 | 1001000 |
| 9 | 0001011 | 0010111 | 1110100 |
Note: Entries in the R-column are bitwise complements (logical operator: negation
Negation
In logic and mathematics, negation, also called logical complement, is an operation on propositions, truth values, or semantic values more generally. Intuitively, the negation of a proposition is true when that proposition is false, and vice versa. In classical logic negation is normally identified...
) of the respective entries in the L-column. Entries in the G-column are the entries in the R-column in reverse digit order. See pictures of all codes against a colored background.
Bookland
The EAN country codes 978 (and later 979) have been allocated since the 1980s in order to reserve a Unique Country Code (UCC) prefix for EAN identifiers of published books, regardless of country of origin, so that the EAN space can catalog books by ISBN rather than maintaining a redundant parallel numbering system. Similar arrangements are in place for ISSNs (for periodicals) and ISMNs (for sheet music).External links
- Download Open-Source Barcode Generator for EAN-13 (C++, VB, Excel Macros, etc.)
- Barcode PerlPerlPerl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Perl was originally developed by Larry Wall in 1987 as a general-purpose Unix scripting language to make report processing easier. Since then, it has undergone many changes and revisions and become widely popular...
modules at CPANCPANCPAN, the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, is an archive of nearly 100,000 modules of software written in Perl, as well as documentation for it. It has a presence on the World Wide Web at and is mirrored worldwide at more than 200 locations... - An example of EAN8/13 implementation
- EAN MediaWiki extension, a MediaWiki extension, visualizing EAN-13/EAN-8/UPC-A/Code39/Codabar barcodes by specifying only the numbers/symbols in the wiki-text.
- Implementing the EAN-13 barcode in C#
- gepir.gs1.org (works!)
- upcdatabase, another online barcode database
- EAN-Search, free barcode database with 10 million entries
- EAN, UPC, ISBN, ISAN and IMDb Lookup Tool
- Online validation tool and graphics generator of EAN 8/13 codes
- UPCData.info More information about UPC-A, UPC-E, EAN-13. There is a check digit calculator, data downloads and data feeds available.
Related articles
- EAN 8EAN 8An EAN-8 is a barcode and is derived from the longer European Article Number code. It was introduced for use on small packages where an EAN-13 barcode would be too large; for example on cigarettes, pencils , and chewing gum packets.EAN-8 barcodes may be used to encode GTIN-8s which are another set...
, another form of EAN barcode - Electronic Data InterchangeElectronic Data InterchangeElectronic data interchange is the structured transmission of data between organizations by electronic means. It is used to transfer electronic documents or business data from one computer system to another computer system, i.e...
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- Global Electronic Party Information RegisterGlobal Electronic Party Information RegisterThe Global Electronic Party Information Register is a distributed database that contains basic information on over 1,000,000 companies in over 100 countries....
(GEPIR) a searchable distributed database of GS1GS1Founded in 1977, GS1 is an international not-for-profit association dedicated to the development and implementation of global standards and solutions to improve the efficiency and visibility of supply and demand chains globally and across multiple sectors...
GTINs - GTIN