


Barcodes are numbers used as stock control mechanisms by retailers: as such they are highly standardised and well recognised, and form an invaluable identifier for communication between companies. On physical releases, they usually appear in the form of a machine-readable series of black and white bars, hence the name "barcode".

There are many different types of barcode, but the ones usually found on music releases are two:


See the guideline for barcodes.

Other identifiers


List of country codes to find where an EAN comes from.