International Mailing Address Formats : Addresses in the Spanish Language

Abbreviations and Special Terms

Some Abbreviations and Terms Commonly Used In Addresses
3o	3rd Floor
3o	3rd Floor
3ª	3rd Door (NOT Floor!)
At.	Attention:
Avda.	Avenue
Barrio	Neighborhood (of a city)
C	sometimes stands for "Calle" = "Street"
Calle	Street
Casilla de Correo	Post Office Box
Col.	Neighborhood (Colonia) e.g. Col. Coyoacan --> the Coyocan Neighborhood. Used in Mexico.
D.F.	"Federal District" -- in some countries, the equivalent of the "D.C." or "Capital District" in the U.S.'s "Washington D.C."
Dpto.	Department
Dto.	(a less commonly used abbreviation for 'department.')
No.	(Usually indicates that a house/building number follows. Occurs in only some addresses.)
Piso	Floor
Placita	Place
Pta.	Door (Puerta)
s/n	without ("sin") number -- as when a building is on a street, but doesn't have a building/house number.
Sr.	Mr./Mister (Señor)
Sra.	Mrs. (Señora)
Srta.	Miss (Señorita)

More Terms and Abbreviations: Links

The "Hispanic Naming Conventions" section of an interesting PDF on international naming conventions, with some proofreading problems:

[an excerpt, with minor corrections:] The Hispanic honorifics Señor, Señora, and Señorita are truncated as Sr., Sra., Srta., respectively. The word "Don" at the beginning of a person’s name indicates a title of respect to a distinguished or older individual (memorialized in American pop culture with Don Corleone of the Godfather fame). Common professional designations include Lcdo., Ldo., or Licenciado (denoting a Lawyer, or "licensed"); Rdo. or Reverendo (denoting a Priest or Reverend); and Ing. or Ingeniero (denoting an engineer, considered in many parts of Latin America as one of the most honored professions.)

Google Ad is sometimes shown above.

Format and layout of a letter in Spanish includes some address information. Address placement on the envelope: The address on the front of the envelope should be started half way down its length with a left hand margin of one third of the envelope width. The left margin is usually vertical all the way down for commercial letters. The postal company Oficina de Correos of Spain advises that the sender's address (remitente) should be written on the flap on the reverse of the envelope. This advice seems to be adhered to for all types of letters both in Spain and in South America. In personal hand written mail, it is common to see REM: on the back flap followed by the sender's address. Note: Leave the area near the bottom of the envelope blank on both the front and back. Postal processing machines may want to print bar codes at the bottom of the envelope. Address format: C = calle - street. Spanish does not use the myriad of possibilities and English does with: road, way, mews, lane etc. but there are some other names. ... Fernando is the name of the street then there is a comma and the street number. In Spain, most people live in flats so you must write a dash then the floor number (4º) and the letter (B) of the flat. ... The following line contains the post or zip code. This refers to a section of the city. The variable in this example is 1018, while the 4 will always refer to Seville city or province. The name of the city written within the address is written in capitals. España is written only if the letter comes from abroad, of course, and only the first letter is in capitals. AskOxford: Writing Letters in Spanish Includes a bit of general information on address formats, honorifics, and abbreviations.

More Information for Specific Countries, Including Example Addresses

 

• Argentina
• Chile
• Costa Rica
• Mexico
• Puerto Rico (click on "Island Addresses" tab)
• Spain
• Uruguay
• U.S. Virgin Islands (click on "Island Addresses" tab)
• Venezuela
• For other specific countries try the UPU's website.

• Postage from the United States to Mexico, Spain, the rest of Latin America, and the rest of the world.

• International Address Search Help : includes links to address directories and spanish-to-english phrase list(s) for finding addresses in Mexico, Spain, and other countries.

The page you are now looking at is an appendage of the International Mailing Address Formats page.

Disclaimer

Although these links and other information were compiled by BitBoost Systems personnel primarily for the use of such personnel: None of the information included or linked to is guaranteed by BitBoost Systems to be available or correct. Nor is it guaranteed by any personnel or organizations associated with BitBoost Systems. BitBoost Systems takes no reponsibility for the results of using such links or other information.