International Article Number

GTIN-13 number encoded in EAN-13 barcode. First digit is always placed outside the symbol; additionally a right quiet zone indicator (>) is used to indicate Quiet Zones that are necessary for barcode scanners to work properly.

An EAN-13 barcode (originally European Article Number, but now renamed International Article Number even though the abbreviation EAN has been retained) is a 13 digit (12 data and 1 check) barcoding standard which is a superset of the original 12-digit Universal Product Code (UPC) system developed in the United States. The EAN-13 barcode is defined by the standards organization GS1.

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. All the numbers encoded in UPC and EAN barcodes are known as Global Trade Item Numbers (GTIN), and they can be encoded in other GS1 barcodes.

The less commonly used EAN-8 barcodes are used also for marking retail goods; however, they are usually reserved for smaller items, for example confectionery.

2-digit (EAN 2) and 5-digit (EAN 5) 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.

Payload: GTIN-13 number

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 checksum 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

Further information: [[:List of GS1 country codes]]

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 GTINs and the Serial Shipping Container Code (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:

Weights

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:

Weights

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:

Calculation

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	3	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 8 code we get: 7351353 or in the table:

Getting the weights for a barcode

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 10 = 3
10 minus 3 makes the checksum = 7

The complete EAN 8 code is then: 73513537

Binary encoding of data digits into EAN-13 barcode

Encoding EAN-13

the numbers of code L

the numbers of code G

the numbers of code R

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.

Structure of EAN-13

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

Encoding of the digits

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) 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

Main article: 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).

See also

• Japanese Article Number
• EAN 8, another form of EAN barcode
• Electronic Data Interchange
• European Article Numbering-Uniform Code Council
• Global Electronic Party Information Register (GEPIR) a searchable distributed database of GS1 GTINs
• GTIN

External links

• Download Open-Source Barcode Generator for EAN-13 (C++, VB, Excel Macros, etc.)
• Barcode Perl modules at CPAN
• 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.