For the purposes of directing mail, the United Kingdom (although the populations listed just show figures for England, Wales and Northern Ireland), is divided by

Royal Mail Royal Mail Group Limited, trading as Royal Mail, is a British postal service and courier company. It is owned by International Distribution Services. It operates the brands Royal Mail (letters and parcels) and Parcelforce Worldwide (parcels) ...

into postcode areas. The postcode area is the largest geographical unit used and forms the initial characters of the alphanumeric

UK postcode Postal codes used in the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown dependencies are known as postcodes (originally, postal codes). They are alphanumeric (the UK is one of only 11 countries or territories to use alphanumeric codes o ...

. There are currently 121 geographic postcode areas in use in the UK, and a further 3 often combined with them which cover the

Crown Dependencies The Crown Dependencies are three dependent territory, offshore island territories in the British Islands that are self-governing possessions of the The Crown, British Crown: the Bailiwick of Guernsey and the Jersey, Bailiwick of Jersey, both lo ...

of Guernsey, Jersey and Isle of Man.

References

{{Reflist Postcode areas of the United Kingdom