The pattern in the braille alphabet
The letters are built in rows of ten. The first ten, a–j, use only the top four dots (1, 2, 4 and 5). The next ten, k–t, are exactly the same shapes with dot 3 added: k is a plus dot 3, l is b plus dot 3, and so on. The last row adds dots 3 and 6 to the first five shapes to make u, v, x, y and z; w (dots 2-4-5-6) does not follow the pattern. Learning a–j therefore gets you most of the way to the whole alphabet — and, with the number sign, to all ten digits.
Capital and number signs
Braille has no separate capital letters or numerals. A dot 6 cell before a letter makes it a capital (two of them capitalise a whole word), and the number sign, dots 3-4-5-6, turns the letters a–j into the digits 1–0 until a space or other symbol ends the number. In Unified English Braille, a lowercase letter a–j immediately after a number takes the grade 1 indicator (dots 5-6) so it is not read as another digit.
This chart shows uncontracted (grade 1) signs, which are the building blocks of both grades. Type any text into the braille translator to see it in UEB grade 1, with a dot diagram for every cell.
Sources
- The Rules of Unified English Braille, Third Edition 2024 (ICEB) — §4.1 letters, §5 grade 1 indicators, §6 numeric mode, §7 punctuation, §8 capitalisation
- Unicode Standard — Braille Patterns code chart (U+2800–U+28FF)
- Braille Authority of North America — Implementation of UEB in the US (4 January 2016)