History and Overview of ISBN
- The Standard Book Number (SBN) was developed in 1965 by WHSmith, a British bookseller and stationers.
- The ISBN identification format was conceived in 1967 in the United Kingdom by David Whitaker and in 1968 in the United States by Emery Koltay.
- The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and published in 1970.
- The United Kingdom used the nine-digit SBN code until 1974.
- The International ISBN Agency is the registration authority for ISBN worldwide.
- Each edition and variation of a publication is assigned a separate ISBN.
- The ISBN is thirteen digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, and ten digits long if assigned before 2007.
- An ISBN consists of four parts (for a 10-digit ISBN) or five parts (for a 13-digit ISBN).
- The parts of a 13-digit ISBN include the prefix element, registration group element, registrant element, publication element, and checksum character.
- The parts of a 10-digit ISBN and the corresponding EAN-13 and barcode can differ in check digits.
Issuing Process and Registration Group Element
- ISBNs are issued by the ISBN registration agency responsible for each country or territory.
- The ranges of ISBNs assigned to a country depend on its publishing profile.
- Some ISBN registration agencies receive direct funding from governments, while others are provided by non-governmental organizations.
- A directory of ISBN agencies is available on the International ISBN Agency website.
- In the United States, R. R. Bowker is responsible for ISBN issuance.
- The ISBN registration group element is a 1-to-5-digit number within a prefix element (978 or 979).
- Registration groups are allocated within the 978 prefix element, with 0 or 1 for English-speaking countries, 2 for French-speaking countries, 3 for German-speaking countries, 4 for Japan, 5 for Russian-speaking countries, and 7 for China.
- The 979 prefix element is reserved for International Standard Music Numbers (ISMNs), but it does not receive ISBNs.
- Registration groups within the 979 prefix element include 8 for the United States, 10 for France, 11 for South Korea, and 12 for Italy.
Statistics and Registrant Element
- The United States had the highest number of registered ISBNs in 2020, with over 3.9 million.
- Other countries with significant ISBN registrations in 2020 include South Korea (329,582), Germany (284,000), China (263,066), the UK (188,553), and Indonesia (144,793).
- The United States had over 39 million lifetime ISBN registrations in 2020.
- The national ISBN agency assigns the registrant element and an accompanying series of ISBNs to the publisher.
- The publisher then allocates one of the ISBNs to each of its books.
- In most countries, assigning an ISBN to a book is not legally required, but most large bookstores only handle publications with ISBNs.
- The International ISBN Agency maintains the details of over one million ISBN prefixes and publishers in the Global Register of Publishers.
- Publishers receive blocks of ISBNs, with larger blocks allotted to publishers expecting to need them.
ISBN-10 Check Digits and Block Length Variations
- The ISBN-10 check digit must range from 0 to 10, with the symbol X used for 10.
- The sum of the ten digits, each multiplied by its weight, must be a multiple of 11.
- The check digit is a form of redundancy check used for error detection.
- The ISBN-10 check digit method ensures that it will always be possible to detect the most common types of error.
- There are no pairs of valid ISBN-10s with eight identical digits and two transposed digits.
- Publishers receive blocks of ISBNs, with variable block lengths.
- Larger publishers may be given a block of ISBNs with fewer digits allocated for the registrant element.
- Countries publishing many titles have few allocated digits for the registration group identifier.
- The allocation of ISBNs can be customised by registration agencies.
- A publisher may have different allotted registrant elements and there may be more than one registration group identifier used in a country.
ISBN-13 Check Digit Calculation and Errors in Usage
- The ISBN-13 check digit must range from 0 to 9.
- The sum of all thirteen digits, each multiplied by its weight (alternating between 1 and 3), must be a multiple of 10.
- The calculation is the same for both ISBN-13 and EAN-13.
- The check digit calculation excludes the check digit itself.
- The check digit is calculated by summing the products and finding the remainder when divided by 10.
- Publishers sometimes fail to check the correspondence of a book title and its ISBN.
- This causes book identification problems for libraries, booksellers, and readers.
- Some books share the same ISBN, leading to confusion.
- Invalid ISBNs are often displayed by libraries and booksellers.
- The Library of Congress tags books with invalid ISBNs as 'Cancelled ISBN.'
- The terms eISBN and e-ISBN should be avoided.
- Each digital format of a book must have its own ISBN.
- There is no generic eISBN that encompasses all e-book formats.
- EPUB, Kindle, and PDF formats will have their own specific ISBNs.
- The terms eISBN and e-ISBN have caused confusion in the past.
- The barcodes on books are EAN-13, with a separate EAN-5 for currency and retail price.
- For 10-digit ISBNs, the number 978 is prefixed to the barcode data.
- The check digit is recalculated using the EAN-13 formula.
- The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) migrated to a 13-digit ISBN.
- The 13-digit ISBNs began with 978, and as
The International Standard Book Number (ISBN) is a numeric commercial book identifier that is intended to be unique. Publishers purchase or receive ISBNs from an affiliate of the International ISBN Agency.
 A 13-digit ISBN, 978-3-16-148410-0, as represented by an EAN-13 bar code | |
| Acronym | ISBN |
|---|---|
| Organisation | International ISBN Agency |
| Introduced | 1970 |
| No. of digits | 13 (formerly 10) |
| Check digit | Weighted sum |
| Example | 978-3-16-148410-0 |
| Website | isbn-international |
An ISBN is assigned to each separate edition and variation (except reprintings) of a publication. For example, an e-book, a paperback and a hardcover edition of the same book will each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is ten digits long if assigned before 2007, and thirteen digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007. The method of assigning an ISBN is nation-specific and varies between countries, often depending on how large the publishing industry is within a country.
The initial ISBN identification format was devised in 1967, based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering (SBN) created in 1966. The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO 2108 (the 9-digit SBN code can be converted to a 10-digit ISBN by prefixing it with a zero).
Privately published books sometimes appear without an ISBN. The International ISBN Agency sometimes assigns such books ISBNs on its own initiative.
Another identifier, the International Standard Serial Number (ISSN), identifies periodical publications such as magazines and newspapers. The International Standard Music Number (ISMN) covers musical scores.
