Braille Punctuation: The Complete UEB Chart

Braille punctuation in Unified English Braille (UEB) follows one simple pattern: the ten everyday marks (period, comma, question mark, exclamation mark, semicolon, colon, apostrophe, hyphen and double quotes) each take one cell built only from dots 2, 3, 5 and 6, the lower part of the cell. No letter is written that way. Everything else, from parentheses to the @ sign, takes two cells: a prefix plus a cell.

The period is ⠲ (dots 2, 5 and 6) and the comma is ⠂ (dot 2). Below you will find the full chart, the cells that mean more than one thing, sentences broken down cell by cell, and how English punctuation differs from Spanish.

Key points

• The ten basic marks use only dots 2, 3, 5 and 6. No letter from a to z fits in those dots: every letter raises dot 1 or dot 4.
• Brackets, the dash, single quotes and symbols such as / * & @ # % $ take two cells: a prefix cell and a base cell.
• The question mark and the opening double quote are the same cell, ⠦. Position tells them apart.
• Math operators take a dot 5 prefix, so + (⠐⠖) never gets confused with ! (⠖).
• In grade 2, most of the lower cells also stand for contractions: ⠆ is be, ⠴ is was, ⠦ is his. Position decides.
• Punctuation needs no indicator: unlike numbers and capitals, a mark is written directly in its cell.
• UEB and Spanish braille disagree on basic marks: the English period, ⠲, is not the Spanish one, ⠄.

The pattern: punctuation lives in the lower dots

The braille cell has two columns of three dots: 1, 2 and 3 down the left, 4, 5 and 6 down the right. The alphabet is built on the top square (dots 1, 2, 4 and 5), adding dots 3 and 6 for later letters, but every letter keeps something at the top.

The basic punctuation marks do the opposite: they stay at the bottom. Checked against the translation tables, this is how it splits:

The other half of the check is what makes this useful: none of the 26 letters fits in those four dots. Every letter raises dot 1 or dot 4. So a finger that meets a cell with nothing on top knows, before identifying it, that it is not a letter. You can see it on the braille alphabet chart: every letter has a dot in the top row.

The basic marks

These are the ten you will meet in almost every sentence. All cells on this page are generated with liblouis, the open-source braille translator, and checked against the English data in the Braillito app.

Look at the first two rows, the ones people search for most. The comma is a single raised dot, dot 2. The period is three dots, 2, 5 and 6. In Spanish braille, by contrast, the period is a single dot 3, which in English is the apostrophe. More on that below.

Two-cell signs: brackets, dashes and symbols

Everything beyond the basic ten needs two cells. The first is a prefix (dot 4, dot 5, dot 6, dots 4-5-6 or dots 4-6) and the second a base cell.

Two patterns make these easier to learn. All brackets share the same base cells, ⠣ to open and ⠜ to close, and the prefix says which kind: dot 5 for round, dots 4-6 for square, dots 4-5-6 for curly. And single quotes are double quotes with dot 6 in front.

The dash covers both the en dash (–) and the em dash (—) of print. The ellipsis (…) is simply three periods, ⠲⠲⠲.

The cells that mean more than one thing

In grade 1, the only real collision is between the question mark and the opening double quote: both are ⠦, dots 2, 3 and 6. Position resolves it. After a word, it is a question mark; before a word, it opens a quotation.

This sentence has both, plus the closing quote:

The first cell opens the quote, the ⠦ after it (written ⠭ in grade 2) is the question mark, and ⠴ closes the quote.

In grade 2, the lower cells work harder. Because they are distinctive to the touch, UEB reuses most of them as contractions, and the position of the cell tells the reader which meaning applies:

A cell standing alone between spaces is read as a word, one inside a word as a letter group, and one right after a word as punctuation. That is why grade 2 can reuse these cells without confusing experienced readers, and why beginners take a little longer to read them. The full list of contractions is in braille contractions.

Math signs take a prefix

Basic operators in UEB all start with dot 5:

The prefix is what stops + from reading as !, and × from reading as a question mark: the base cells are the same, the prefix is not. So 1 + 2 = 3 is ⠼⠁⠐⠖⠼⠃⠐⠶⠼⠉. Numbers themselves use the numeric indicator, ⠼, explained in braille numbers.

These operators are enough for simple arithmetic in ordinary text. Real mathematics, with fractions, exponents and roots, uses the technical side of UEB or, in the United States, the Nemeth Code: a separate system.

Sentences broken down

Three sentences with punctuation, in grade 1 and grade 2. The cell count leaves out spaces.

The first one, cell by cell, in grade 1:

Two things are easier to see in a table than in a paragraph. Punctuation takes no indicator: numbers need one and capitals need one, but a punctuation mark goes straight into its cell. And the comma after Hello is a single dot, which is why an embossed comma is so easy to miss at first.

In the third sentence, look at the date range: the hyphen in 1809-1852 ends the number, so the numeric indicator comes back for the second year: ⠼⠁⠓⠚⠊⠤⠼⠁⠓⠑⠃.

One more detail that surprises people: in grade 2, e-mail is ⠰⠑⠤⠍⠁⠊⠇. A lone e before a hyphen would read as the word every, so the grade 1 indicator, ⠰, marks it as a plain letter.

English and Spanish braille punctuation are different

If you read both, be careful: the same cell can mean different marks.

The Spanish period is the English apostrophe, and the Spanish quotation mark is the English question mark. Spanish also writes the opening ¿ and the closing ? with the same cell. The full Spanish chart is in the Spanish braille alphabet, and why codes differ between languages is in braille in other languages.

What this chart does not cover

Three honest limits of this page:

1. It is the common set, not every symbol. UEB has signs for currency, arrows, typeform indicators (bold, italic, underline) and much more. For professional transcription, the reference is the Rules of Unified English Braille from the International Council on English Braille.
2. Some choices depend on meaning. In print, ’ can be an apostrophe or a closing single quote. UEB writes them differently, ⠄ and ⠠⠴, so the transcriber has to know which one it is.
3. Grade 2 rules interact with punctuation. Whether a lower cell is read as a contraction or a mark depends on spacing and position, and there are exceptions this page does not list.

If you are just starting, the sensible order is letters, then numbers, then punctuation. How to learn braille walks you through it, and you can check any sentence in the braille translator.

Frequently asked questions

How do you write a period in braille?

In Unified English Braille, with dots 2, 5 and 6: ⠲. It needs no indicator before it. In Spanish braille, by contrast, the period is a single dot 3.

How do you write a comma in braille?

With dot 2 alone: ⠂. It is the smallest punctuation mark, a single raised dot in the middle of the left column.

Is the question mark the same as a quotation mark in braille?

In UEB, the question mark and the opening double quote are the same cell, ⠦, dots 2, 3 and 6. Position tells them apart: after a word it is a question mark, before a word it opens a quotation. The closing quote is a different cell, ⠴.

How do you write parentheses in braille?

With two cells each: ⠐⠣ to open and ⠐⠜ to close. The first cell, dot 5, says they are round brackets. Square brackets use dots 4-6 in front, and curly brackets dots 4-5-6.

Does punctuation need an indicator in braille?

No. Numbers take the numeric indicator and capitals the capital indicator, but punctuation marks are written directly in their own cells.

Why does braille punctuation use the lower dots?

So it cannot be mistaken for a letter. Every letter from a to z raises dot 1 or dot 4, so a cell with nothing in its top row tells the finger, even before it identifies the mark, that this is not a letter.

Is the plus sign the same as the exclamation mark?

Not in UEB. The exclamation mark is ⠖, and plus is ⠐⠖: the same base cell with a dot 5 prefix. In Spanish braille, by contrast, the two are written with the same cell.