Reference
The braille alphabet
All 26 letters, each shown as a dot pattern with its dot numbers. Follow any letter for how it is constructed, which letters it is confused with, and what it means in Grade 2.
Learn it as three groups, not 26 letters
Louis Braille built the alphabet from ten base shapes and then reused them. Learn decade 1 properly and you have effectively learned the other two, because each is the same ten shapes with dots added in a fixed place. The same ten shapes also carry the digits, and moved down one row they become the punctuation marks — so a reader who knows the first ten letters already knows most of the code. Why the alphabet is built this way is a question of French history rather than design.
| Decade | Letters | Rule |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | abcdefghij | The ten base shapes, built from dots 1, 2, 4 and 5 only. |
| 2 | klmnopqrst | Decade 1 with dot 3 added to every cell. |
| 3 | uvxyz | Decade 2 with dots 3 and 6 added. |
w breaks the pattern. Louis Braille built the code for French, which had no letter w, so w was added later and does not follow decade 3. It is dots 2-4-5-6.
The alphabet as one image
Every letter and its dot numbers on a single chart, for printing, sharing, or dropping into a lesson.
Next
Numbers
How the number sign turns a to j into the digits 1 to 0.
Punctuation
Commas, full stops, quotes and the rest.
Printable chart
The whole code on one printable page.
Practice drill
Drill the cells until you recognise them without counting dots.
Your name in braille
Any name broken down letter by letter, always in Grade 1.