Geography & Postcodes

Eircode is the Republic of Ireland's national postal code system, introduced in 2015. Each of the 2.2 million addresses has a unique 7-character code (e.g. D02 AF30). The first three characters identify a routing key; the last four identify the individual letterbox. Eircode is used by emergency services, satnav and increasingly by UK businesses delivering to Ireland.

A UK postcode area is the first one or two letters of a postcode (e.g. SW for South-West London, M for Manchester, EH for Edinburgh). There are 124 postcode areas covering the United Kingdom. Areas split into districts (SW1), then sectors (SW1A 1) and finally unit postcodes (SW1A 1AA). Postcode areas are widely used as marketing territories and for service-area definitions.