What is a Braille cell?

A Braille cell is a grid of six dot positions arranged in two columns of three. Dots 1, 2, 3 run down the left column and 4, 5, 6 down the right. Any combination of raised dots forms a character.

What is Grade 1 Braille?

Grade 1, or uncontracted Braille, spells out every word letter by letter with one cell per character. Grade 2 adds contractions where single cells stand for common words or letter groups, which this chart does not cover.

How are numbers written in Braille?

Digits reuse the patterns for letters A through J, preceded by the number sign (dots 3, 4, 5, 6). So 1 is the same cell as A and 0 is the same cell as J once the number sign has appeared.

How is a capital letter shown?

A capital sign (dot 6) is placed immediately before a letter to capitalise it. For an all-capital word, the capital sign is doubled. The letters themselves keep their normal patterns.

Is Braille the same in every language?

The basic letter cells are widely shared, but each language defines its own accented letters, punctuation, and contractions. This chart shows standard English Braille; other languages add or remap cells.

Braille Reference Chart

Email me this result

Get this tool's output sent to your inbox, plus one useful tool a week. No spam, unsubscribe any time.

Braille reference chart

Braille encodes characters as patterns of raised dots in a six-position cell, read by touch. This reference shows the Grade 1 (uncontracted) English pattern for every letter, digit, and common punctuation mark, with each cell drawn and labelled by dot number.

How it works

Every Braille character lives in a 2 by 3 cell. The positions are numbered down the left column as 1, 2, 3 and down the right column as 4, 5, 6. A character is defined by which of those six dots are raised — for example A is just dot 1, and C is dots 1 and 4.

Numbers do not have their own cells. They reuse the patterns for letters A through J, but only after a number sign (dots 3, 4, 5, 6) tells the reader to switch to digit mode. Likewise a capital sign (dot 6) before a letter marks it as uppercase. These prefix signs let a small alphabet cover letters, digits, and capitals.

Tips and notes

Filled circles in the grid are raised dots; outlined circles are flat positions. The caption lists the raised dot numbers, such as 1-4-5 for D.
Grade 1 spells everything out. Real-world books usually use Grade 2, which adds contractions — those single-cell shortcuts are not shown here.
The first ten letters (A–J) use only the top four dots (1, 2, 4, 5), which is why they double neatly as the digits 1–0.