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A size chart illustrating the ISO A series and a comparison with American letter and legal formats.

Comparison of some paper and photographic paper sizes close to the A4 size.

Many paper size standards conventions have existed at different times and in different countries. Today there is one widespread international ISO standard (including A4, B3, C4, etc.) and a localised standard used in North America (including letter, legal, ledger, etc.). The paper sizes affect writing paper, stationery, cards, and some printed documents. The standards also have related sizes for envelopes.

The international standard: ISO 216[link]

A series[link]

The international paper size standard, ISO 216, is based on the German DIN 476 standard for paper sizes. ISO paper sizes are all based on a single aspect ratio of square root of 2, or approximately 1:1.4142. The base A0 size of paper is defined to have an area of one m². With this definition and the given aspect ratio of square root of two, one can calculate the sides of an A0 sheet as follows: The long side is 1 metre multiplied by the square root of the square root (that is, the fourth root) of 2 and the short side is 1 metre divided by the same. Rounded to millimetres, the A0 paper size is 841 by 1,189 millimetres (33.1 × 46.8 in).

Successive paper sizes in the series A1, A2, A3, and so forth, are defined by halving the preceding paper size along the larger dimension. The most frequently used paper size is A4 210 by 297 millimetres (8.3 × 11.7 in).

The significant advantage of this system is its scaling: if a sheet with an aspect ratio of Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): \sqrt{2}

is divided into two equal halves parallel to its shortest sides, then the halves will again have an aspect ratio of Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): \sqrt{2}

. Folded brochures of any size can be made by using sheets of the next larger size, e.g. A4 sheets are folded to make A5 brochures. The system allows scaling without compromising the aspect ratio from one size to another—as provided by office photocopiers, e.g. enlarging A4 to A3 or reducing A3 to A4. Similarly, two sheets of A4 can be scaled down and fit exactly 1 sheet without any cutoff or margins. Weights are easy to calculate as well: a standard A4 sheet made from 80 gram/m² paper weighs 5 grams (as it is one 16th of an A0 page, measuring 1 m²), allowing one to easily compute the weight—and associated postage rate—by counting the number of sheets used.

The advantages of basing a paper size upon an aspect ratio of Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): \sqrt{2}

were already noted in 1786 by the German scientist and philosopher Georg Christoph Lichtenberg.[1] Early in the 20th century, Dr Walter Porstmann turned Lichtenberg's idea into a proper system of different paper sizes. Porstmann's system was introduced as a DIN standard (DIN 476) in Germany in 1922, replacing a vast variety of other paper formats. Even today the paper sizes are called "DIN A4" in everyday use in Germany and Austria.  The term Lichtenberg ratio has recently been proposed for this paper aspect ratio.

The main disadvantage of the system is type does not scale the same way; therefore, when a page is resized, the type set on it loses legibility as the proportion between the type's x-height, page margins, and leading are distorted. When trim is involved, as in the manufacture of books, ISO 216 sizes are generally too tall and narrow for book production (see: Canons of page construction). The distortion is even more pronounced with printed sheet music. European book publishers typically use metricated traditional page sizes for book production.

The DIN 476 standard spread quickly to other countries. Before the outbreak of World War II, it had been adopted by the following countries:

During World War II, the standard was adopted by Uruguay (1942), Argentina (1943) and Brazil (1943); and afterwards spread to other countries:

A4[link]

By 1975 so many countries were using the German system that it was established as an ISO standard, as well as the official United Nations document format. By 1977 A4 was the standard letter format in 88 of 148 countries. Today the standard has been adopted by all countries in the world except the United States and Canada. In Mexico, Costa Rica, Colombia, Venezuela, Chile and the Philippines the US letter format is still in common use, despite their official adoption of the ISO standard.

B series[link]

A size chart illustrating the ISO B series.

In addition to the A series, there is a less common B series. The area of B series sheets is the geometric mean of successive A series sheets. So, B1 is between A0 and A1 in size, with an area of 0.707 m² (Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): \sqrt{1/2}

m²). As a result, B0 is 1 metre wide, and other sizes in the B series are a half, a quarter or further fractions of a metre wide. While less common in office use, it is used for a variety of special situations. Many posters use B-series paper or a close approximation, such as 50 cm×70 cm; B5 is a relatively common choice for books. The B series is also used for envelopes and passports.

C series[link]

A size chart illustrating the ISO C series.

The C series is used only for envelopes and is defined in ISO 269. The area of C series sheets is the geometric mean of the areas of the A and B series sheets of the same number; for instance, the area of a C4 sheet is the geometric mean of the areas of an A4 sheet and a B4 sheet. This means that C4 is slightly larger than A4, and B4 slightly larger than C4. The practical usage of this is that a letter written on A4 paper fits inside a C4 envelope, and a C4 envelope fits inside a B4 envelope.

The tolerances specified in the standard are

• ±1.5 mm (0.06 in) for dimensions up to 150 mm (5.9 in),
• ±2 mm (0.08 in) for lengths in the range 150 to 600 mm (5.9 to 23.6 in) and
• ±3 mm (0.12 in) for any dimension above 600 mm (23.6 in).

German extensions[link]

The German standard DIN 476 was published in 1922 and is the original specification of the A and B sizes. It differs in two details from its international successor:

DIN 476 provides an extension to formats larger than A0, denoted by a prefix factor. In particular, it lists the two formats 2A0, which is twice the area of A0, and 4A0, which is four times A0:

DIN 476 also specifies slightly tighter tolerances:

• ±1 mm (0.04 in) for dimensions up to 150 mm (5.9 in),
• ±1.5 mm (0.06 in) for lengths in the range 150 mm to 600 mm (5.9 to 23.6 in) and
• ±2 mm (0.08 in) for any dimension above 600 mm (23.6 in).

Swedish extensions[link]

Comparison of ISO 216 and Swedish standard SIS 014711 paper sizes between A4 and A3 sizes.

The Swedish standard SIS 014711 generalized the ISO system of A, B, and C formats by adding D, E, F, and G formats to it. Its D format sits between a B format and the next larger A format (just like C sits between A and the next larger B). The remaining formats fit in between all these formats, such that the sequence of formats A4, E4, C4, G4, B4, F4, D4, H4, A3 is a geometric progression, in which the dimensions grow by a factor 2^1/16 from one size to the next. However, the SIS 014711 standard does not define any size between a D format and the next larger A format (called H in the previous example). Of these additional formats, G5 (169 × 239 mm) and E5 (155 × 220 mm) are popular in Sweden for printing dissertations,^{[citation needed]} but the other formats have not turned out to be particularly useful in practice and they have not been adopted internationally.

Japanese B-series variant[link]

The JIS defines two main series of paper sizes. The JIS A-series is identical to the ISO A-series, but with slightly different tolerances. The area of B-series paper is 1.5 times that of the corresponding A-paper (instead of the factor 1.414... for the ISO B-series), so the length ratio is approximately 1.22 times the length of the corresponding A-series paper. The aspect ratio of the paper is the same as for A-series paper. Both A- and B-series paper is widely available in Japan, Taiwan and China, and most photocopiers are loaded with at least A4 and either one of A3, B4 and B5 paper.

There are also a number of traditional paper sizes, which are now used mostly only by printers. The most common of these old series are the Shiroku-ban and the Kiku paper sizes.

Colombian common sizes naming[link]

The most common paper sizes used for commercial and industrial printing in Colombia are close to the ISO B1, B2 and B3 and are referred to as pliego, ¹⁄₂ pliego and ¹⁄₄ pliego respectively. The "Super-B" size is known as extratabloide.

North American paper sizes[link]

Loose sizes[link]

Current standard sizes of U.S., Canadian and Mexican paper are a subset of the traditional inch-based sizes described below. "Letter", "legal", "ledger", and "tabloid" are by far the most commonly used of these for everyday activities. The origins of the exact dimensions of "letter" size paper (8+¹⁄₂ × 11 in or 215.9 × 279.4 mm) are lost in tradition and not well documented. The American Forest and Paper Association argues that the dimension originates from the days of manual paper making, and that the 11 inch length of the page is about a quarter of "the average maximum stretch of an experienced vatman's arms."^[2] However, this does not explain the width or aspect ratio. Outside of North America, Letter size is also known as "American Quarto"^[3] and the size is indeed almost exactly a quarter of the old Imperial (British) paper size known as Demy 4to (17½"×22½"), allowing ½" for trimming.^[4]

There is an additional paper size, to which the name "government-letter" was given by the IEEE Printer Working Group: the 8 × 10+¹⁄₂ in (203.2 × 266.7 mm) paper that is used in the United States and Canada for children's writing. It was prescribed by Herbert Hoover when he was Secretary of Commerce to be used for U.S. government forms, apparently to enable discounts from the purchase of paper for schools. In later years, as photocopy machines proliferated, citizens wanted to make photocopies of the forms, but the machines did not generally have this size paper in their bins. Ronald Reagan therefore had the U.S. government switch to regular letter size (8+¹⁄₂ × 11 in/215.9 × 279.4 mm).^[2] The 8 × 10+¹⁄₂ in (203.2 × 266.7 mm) size is still commonly used in spiral-bound notebooks and the like.

U.S. paper sizes are currently standard in the United States, the Philippines and Chile. The latter two use U.S. "letter", but the Philippine and Chilean "legal" size is 8+¹⁄₂ × 13 in (215.9 × 330.2 mm).^[6] ISO sizes are available, but not widely used, in both the U.S. and the Philippines.

In Canada, U.S. paper sizes are a de facto standard. The government, however, uses a combination of ISO paper sizes, and CAN 2-9.60M "Paper Sizes for Correspondence" specifies P1 through P6 paper sizes, which are the U.S. paper sizes rounded to the nearest 5 mm.^[7]

Mexico has adopted the ISO standard, but U.S. "letter" format is still the system in use throughout the country. It is virtually impossible to encounter ISO standard papers in day-to-day uses, with "Carta 216 mm × 279 mm" (letter), "Oficio 216 mm × 330 mm" (Government-Legal) and "Doble carta" (ledger/tabloid) being nearly universal. U.S. sizes are also widespread and in common use in Colombia.^[8]

ANSI paper sizes[link]

A size chart illustrating the ANSI sizes.

In 1996, the American National Standards Institute adopted ANSI/ASME Y14.1 which defined a regular series of paper sizes based upon the de facto standard 8+¹⁄₂ × 11 in (215.9 × 279.4 mm) "letter" size which it assigned "ANSI A". This series also includes "ledger"/"tabloid" as "ANSI B". This series is somewhat similar to the ISO standard in that cutting a sheet in half would produce two sheets of the next smaller size. Unlike the ISO standard, however, the arbitrary aspect ratio forces this series to have two alternating aspect ratios. The ANSI series is shown below.

With care, documents can be prepared so that the text and images fit on either ANSI or their equivalent ISO sheets at 1:1 reproduction scale.

Other, larger sizes continuing the alphabetic series illustrated above exist, but it should be noted that they are not part of the series per se, because they do not exhibit the same aspect ratios. For example, Engineering F size (28 × 40 in or 711.2 × 1,016.0 mm) also exists, but is rarely encountered, as are G, H, ... N size drawings. G size is 22+¹⁄₂ in (571.5 mm) high, but variable width up to 90 in (2,286 mm) in increments of 8+¹⁄₂ in (215.9 mm), i.e., roll format. H and larger letter sizes are also roll formats. Such sheets were at one time used for full-scale layouts of aircraft parts, wiring harnesses and the like, but are slowly being phased out, due to widespread use of computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM). Some visual arts fields also continue to use these paper formats for large-scale printouts, such as for displaying digitally painted character renderings at life-size as references for makeup artists and costume designers, or to provide an immersive landscape reference.

Architectural sizes[link]

A size chart illustrating the Architectural sizes.

In addition to the ANSI system as listed above, there is a corresponding series of paper sizes used for architectural purposes. This series also shares the property that bisecting each size produces two of the size below.^[9] It may be preferred by North American architects because the aspect ratios (4:3 and 3:2) are ratios of small integers, unlike their ANSI (or ISO) counterparts. Furthermore, the aspect ratio 4:3 matches the traditional aspect ratio for computer displays.^[9] The architectural series, usually abbreviated "Arch", is shown below:

Other sizes[link]

* This is the same size as the smallest rectangle containing a credit card. However, credit card size, as defined in ISO/IEC 7810, also specifies rounded corners and thickness.

Tablet sizes[link]

The sizes listed above are for paper sold loosely in reams. There are many sizes of tablets of paper, that is, sheets of paper bound at one edge, usually by a strip of plastic or hardened PVA adhesive. Often there is a pad of cardboard (also known as chipboard or greyboard) at the bottom of the stack. Such a tablet serves as a portable writing surface, and the sheets often have lines printed on them, usually in blue, to make writing in a line easier. An older means of binding is to have the sheets stapled to the cardboard along the top of the tablet; there is a line of perforated holes across every page just below the top edge from which any page may be torn off. Lastly, a pad of sheets each weakly stuck with adhesive to the sheet below, trademarked as "Post-It" or "Stick-Em" and available in various sizes, serve as a sort of tablet.

"Letter pads" are 8+¹⁄₂ by 11 inches (215.9 by 279.4 mm), while the term "legal pad" is often used by laymen to refer to pads of various sizes including those of 8+¹⁄₂ by 14 inches (215.9 by 355.6 mm). There are "steno pads" (used by stenographers) of 6 by 9 inches (152.4 by 228.6 mm).

In countries where the ISO sizes are standard, most notebooks and tablets are sized to ISO specifications (for example, most newsagents in Australia stock A4 and A3 tablets).

Traditional inch-based paper sizes[link]

Traditionally, a number of different sizes were defined for large sheets of paper, and paper sizes were defined by the sheet name and the number of times it had been folded. Thus a full sheet of "royal" paper was 25 × 20 inches, and "royal octavo" was this size folded three times, so as to make eight sheets, and was thus 10 by 6¼ inches.

Imperial sizes were used in the United Kingdom and its territories. Some of the base sizes were as follows:

* The sizes marked with an asterisk are still in use in the United States.

Traditional sizes for writing paper in the United Kingdom. These sizes are no longer commonly used since the UK switched to ISO sizes:^[12]

The common divisions and their abbreviations include:

Foolscap folio is often referred to simply as "folio" or "foolscap". Similarly, "quarto" is more correctly "copy draught quarto".

Many of these sizes were only used for making books (see bookbinding), and would never have been offered for ordinary stationery purposes.^[13]

Demitab[link]

The demitab or demi-tab (from the French "demi" or half tabloid) is 5.5 × 8.5 in (140 × 216 mm), equal to one quarter of a sheet of 11 × 17 in (279 × 432 mm) tabloid size paper. In actual circulation, the size 8 × 10.5 in (203 × 267 mm) is common for a demitab.^[14] Tabloid newspapers, which are "generally half the size of a broadsheet", also vary in size. To add to the lack of uniformity, broadsheets also vary in size.

Most industry standards express the direction of the grain last (e.g. 17×11 is short grain paper and 11×17 is long grain paper). See switching costs, network effects and standardization for possible reasons for differing regional adoption rates of the ISO standard sizes.

Transitional paper sizes[link]

PA series[link]

A transitional size called PA4 (210 × 280 mm/8.27 × 11.02 in) was proposed for inclusion into the ISO 216 standard in 1975. It has the height of Canadian P4 paper (215 mm × 280 mm, about 8½ in × 11 in) and the width of international A4 paper (210 × 297 mm/8.27 × 11.69 in). The table to the right, shows how this format can be generalized into an entire format series.

The PA formats did not end up in ISO 216, because the committee felt that the set of standardized paper formats should be kept to the minimum necessary. However, PA4 remains of practical use today. In landscape orientation, it has the same 4:3 aspect ratio as the displays of traditional TV sets, some computer displays and data projectors. PA4, with appropriate margins, is therefore a good choice as the format of presentation slides.

PA4 is also a useful compromise between A4 and US/Canadian Letter sizes. Hence it is used today by many international magazines, because it can be printed easily on equipment designed for either A4 or US Letter.

Antiquarian[link]

Although the movement is towards the international standard metric paper sizes, on the way there from the traditional ones there has been at least one new size just a little larger than that used internationally. British architects and industrial designers once used a size called "Antiquarian" as listed above, but given in the New Metric Handbook (Tutt & Adler 1981) as 813 × 1,372 mm (32 × 54 in) for board size. This is a little larger than the A0 size. So for a short time, a size called A0a (1,000 × 1,370 mm/39.4 × 53.9 in) was used in Britain.

Other metric sizes[link]

Newspaper sizes[link]

Newspapers have a separate set of sizes.

• Berliner
• Broadsheet
• Compact
• Rhenish
• Tabloid (newspaper format)

In a recent trend^{[15][dead link]} many newspapers have been undergoing what is known as "web cut down", in which the publication is redesigned to print using a narrower (and less expensive) roll of paper. In extreme examples, some broadsheet papers are nearly as narrow as traditional tabloids.

See also[link]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• International standard ISO 216, Writing paper and certain classes of printed matter—Trimmed sizes—A and B series. International Organization for Standardization, Geneva, 1975.
• International standard ISO 217: Paper—Untrimmed sizes—Designation and tolerances for primary and supplementary ranges, and indication of machine direction. International Organization for Standardization, Geneva, 1995.
• Max Helbig, Winfried Hennig: DIN-Format A4—Ein Erfolgssystem in Gefahr. Beuth-Kommentare, Beuth Verlag, Berlin, 1998. ISBN 3-410-11878-0
• Arthur D. Dunn: Notes on the standardization of paper sizes. Ottawa, Canada, 54 pages, 1972.

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Paper formats

• Papersize Cheatsheet
• A handy reference website all about paper sizes
• Website about the DIN-A format
• IEEE-ISTO 5101.1-2002 "The Printer Working Group Standard for Media Standardized Names" (PDF)
• Paper Characteristics, Standard Sizes and Size Conversion

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (September 2007)

Roni Size (born Ryan Owen Granville Williams, 29 October 1969, Bristol)^[1] is a British record producer and DJ, who came to prominence in 1997 as the founder and leader of Reprazent, a drum and bass collective. That year they won the Mercury Prize for their album New Forms.

He resurrected Reprazent in 2008 with the release of a deluxe edition of New Forms on Universal.

Early life[link]

Williams, son of Jamaican immigrants,^[2] grew up in the Bristol suburb of St. Andrews. He cites reggae as one of his early influences. He was expelled from school^[2] at the age of 16 and started attending house parties run by Bristol soundsystem The Wild Bunch (a predecessor of Massive Attack). He learned the basics about music production at his local youth club,^[2] the Sefton Park basement project, which provided record players, a mixing desk, drum machines and samplers.^[3] He worked with his brother's comprehensive collection of Studio One records and later set up a home studio, buying a sampler.^[3]

His future musical partner, Krust, had been a member of the Fresh 4, whose "Wishing On A Star" reached the Top Ten of the UK Singles Chart in late 1989.^[4] Williams, Krust, Suv and DJ Die founded Full Cycle Records.

Aided by Chris Lewis, Roni Size founded the record label WTP ("Where's The Party At?") as part of Circus Warp, and in 1993 Full Cycle and Dope Dragon were established in 1993 from that.^[3] RCA Records employee Bryan Gee was an early admirer.^[3] When in 1994 he set up V Recordings, the first releases were Krust's Deceivers EP as catalogue number V001 and Agility, the debut release of Roni Size and DJ Die, as V002.

Musical style[link]

Much of the acclaim centred around Size's melding of the propulsive jungle beats accompanied by live drums and double bass. The band consists of Williams (compositions/programming), DJ Krust, Onallee (vocals), Dynamite MC and rapper Bahamadia (a former protégé of Gang Starr). As a result, Reprazent drum 'n' bass is equally informed by hip-hop, funk, soul and house.

Career[link]

In consolidation of their mainstream breakthrough, Reprazent had a series of festival appearances in summer of 1997 (including Tribal Gathering). Their New Forms LP won the Mercury Music Prize. The singles from the album all featured singer Onallee, whose call for the music in "Brown Paper Bag" is a signal ravers still respond to.^[3] The album went platinum, and Roni Size and his collaborators returned to the studio.

Williams subsequently teamed up with DJ Die and Leonie Laws in Breakbeat Era, before returning to Reprazent to record the second album, October 2000's In The Mode, which included guest vocals from Zack de la Rocha of Rage Against the Machine and Method Man of Wu-Tang Clan. In 2001, he returned to the studio and started working with Tali, who had recently arrived from New Zealand on her album Lyric On My Lip. In this time he also produced Touching Down - released in October 2002. This, his first truly solo album, included 16 tracks segued into one hour's set. He came back to 'V' in 2005 with the release of Return To V, which included vocal collaborations with artists such as Beverly Knight, Jocelyn Brown, Vikter Duplaix and Rodney P.

Roni Size resurrected Reprazent in 2008 with the release of a deluxe edition of New Forms on Universal. The reformed band included original members Dynamite MC, Onallee and bass player Si John alongside Yuval Gabay (Soul Coughing), D Product, Jay Wilcox and Pete Josef. Roni Size and Reprazent toured some of the biggest festivals in Europe, including Bestival, Glastonbury, Lovebox, EXIT and Rock Herk. As a result, they were among the nominees for Best Dance Act from the UK Festival Awards.

The band started 2009 with a tour of Australia as part of the Good Vibrations Festival.^[5] Following on from this, Roni Size and Reprazent returned to North America for the first time in seven years as one of the headliners at the 2009 Ultra Music Festival in Miami. They then went on to perform at Coachella,^[6] appearing as the final act of the festival.

In September 2009, Roni Size and Reprazent played a gig with an orchestra and choir to mark the re-opening of Bristol’s Colston Hall, collaborating with the BBC’s Nature’s Great Events composer, William Goodchild.^[7] In addition to older material, the band played material from a forthcoming Reprazent album.^[7]

Discography[link]

• Music Box (1993)
• Witchcraft (1994) ft. Krust
• Fashion (1995)
• Square Off (1996)
• New Forms (1997)
• Snapshot (1999)
• 26 Bass (1999)
• Ultra-Obscene (1999) with DJ Die under the alias "Breakbeat Era"
• Through the Eyes (2000)
• In the Mode (2000)
• Sound Advice (2002)
• Playtime (2002)
• Touching Down (2002)
• Snapshot 3 (2003)
• Out of Breath (2004)
• Return to V (2004)
• Touching Down, Vol. 2 (2005)
• Friends (2006)
• New Forms² (2008)
• Kops & Robbers (2009)
• Out of Order (2010)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Roni Size discography at Discogs
• Roni Size at rolldabeats
• Roni Size 2008 interview on ilikemusic.com
• Roni Size Exclusive Interview
• Roni Size interview with BBC Bristol
• Roni Size interview with Remixmag