What is the MRZ (Machine Readable Zone)?
Definition
MRZ (Machine Readable Zone)
The Machine Readable Zone (MRZ) is the two- or three-line strip of OCR-readable characters at the bottom of every modern passport and many national ID cards. It encodes the holder's name, nationality, document number, date of birth, sex, expiry date and a check digit, so border-control scanners can read the passport in under a second.
Key facts
| Standard owner | ICAO Doc 9303. The common MRZ rules are in Part 3 §4, "Specifications Common to all MRTDs"; the exact passport layout (TD3) is in Part 4, and the ID-card layouts (TD1/TD2) are in Parts 5 and 6. |
|---|---|
| Format | Two lines for passports (TD3 format) or three lines for ID cards (TD1 format). |
| Characters per line | 44 for passports; 30 for ID cards. |
| Font | OCR-B, monospaced, optimised for optical recognition. |
| First seen | Adopted internationally in the mid-1980s; mandatory on all new passports since 2010. |
| Checked against primary sources. | |
What the MRZ contains
On a passport: the document type, issuing country, surname, given names, passport number, nationality, date of birth, sex, expiry date and personal number, each separated by chevron characters (<<<). Check digits at fixed positions validate that the MRZ has not been tampered with.
Why the MRZ matters at the border
The MRZ is what e-gates scan. The photo and chip are then used to verify the MRZ is genuine. If the MRZ does not match the printed page or the chip, the e-gate sends the passenger to manual inspection.
How the MRZ is related to your photo
The MRZ and the photo are bound together at issuance — the same biometric file that produced the visible photo is hashed into the chip data that the MRZ check digit ultimately validates. A photo retake at renewal also re-issues a new MRZ.
Frequently asked questions
01Can I read my own MRZ?
Yes — the MRZ is plain text in OCR-B font. The chevron characters (<) represent spaces. Each field has a fixed position; the ICAO 9303 standard documents the layout.
02Why are there chevrons (<<<) in my MRZ?
Chevrons fill unused space in fixed-width fields. They are the OCR-friendly equivalent of spaces; the system reads them as null separators between name parts.
03What happens if the MRZ does not match the printed page?
The passport is treated as suspicious. At a border e-gate, the passenger is sent to manual inspection. At a consulate, the application is paused until the discrepancy is resolved with the issuing authority.