Deutsches Institut für Normung

DIN Deutsches Institut für Normung e.V. (DIN German Institute for Standardization) is the German national organization for standardization.

It publishes on average 2,000 standards per year in almost all fields of technology and increasingly in non-technical fields (e.g. services).

Example of DIN standards

  • DIN 476: international paper sizes (now ISO 216 or DIN EN ISO 216). Specifies the System where the paper size DIN A4 is from. In short, there are different series (A,B,C,..). Each series has a number of different sizes. If you go up one with the number, you halve the size. DIN A3 is as large as two pages of DIN A4. The biggest in that series is DIN A0. See Paper size for more.
  • DIN 1301: International System of Units (better known as the SI System of units)
  • DIN 5007: Rules for sorting words alphabetically. Also tells what to do with special characters, like ä or ß.
  • DIN 5008: Rules for writing a (German) letter. Specifies how the letter as a whole should look. Also looks at things like correctly writing a date, or a time.
  • DIN 72552: electric terminal numbers in automobiles
  • DIN 31635: transliteration of the Arabic language.


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