Braille Decoder

Paste Unicode braille dot patterns or 6-dot NABCC ASCII and decode them back to English text immediately. Select Grade 1 or Grade 2 to match your source, or open the braille translator on the homepage for English → UEB braille.

Convert braille → English

UEB grade

Braille input charset

UEB braille (Unicode or ASCII)

0 / 5,000 Unicode code points

Ready. The engine loads locally in your browser on first Convert.

Convert to see English plus Unicode, dot patterns and NABCC ASCII for the cells you pasted.

Choose whether the paste is Unicode or ASCII. ASCII uses the six-dot NABCC subset with lowercase letters. Maximum: 5,000 Unicode code points per run.

English result

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Unicode braille

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Dot patterns / numbers 1–6

Unicode cells show the pattern; numbers name raised dots. 0 = blank cell.

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ASCII braille

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Engine: liblouis 3.39.0 · en-ueb-g1.ctb · text_nabcc.dis. Round-trip match ≠ correctness. Learning and self-check only.

Export result

34 × 25 embosser layout (BRF / PNG)Mirrored PNG (slate & stylus)

DecoderJump to

Example (engine output)

Grade 1 & Grade 2 reverse decoding for “You can go now.” from this site’s liblouis 3.39.0 tables:

Look up unknown cells →

Unicode braille input exampleUEB Grade 1 · 16 cells

Unicode cells

⠠⠽⠕⠥⠀⠉⠁⠝⠀⠛⠕⠀⠝⠕⠺⠲

Decoded English

You can go now.

NABCC ASCII input example6-dot ASCII · Grade 1

ASCII (NABCC)

,you can go now4

Decoded English

You can go now.

Why Grade 1 and Grade 2 decode differently

In UEB Grade 1 (uncontracted), each cell maps 1-to-1 to a letter, digit, or punctuation mark — for example, ⠃ decodes to b. In UEB Grade 2 (contracted), standalone cells and short combinations expand into full words — the same cell ⠃ decodes to but, and ⠠⠽⠕⠥⠀⠉⠀⠛⠀⠝⠺⠲ expands to You can go now. Always match the grade used to write the braille you paste.

Which braille do I need?

Current standard: UEB in the US since 2016; the UK and Australia have also unified on UEB. Match the grade that produced the braille you pasted.

Reading pre-2016 materials → may be EBAE / older British code
Printing or writing now → UEB
Unsure → use UEB, and mark contractions in the result one by one

Select Braille → English (already selected on this page) and UEB Grade 1 or UEB Grade 2 to match your source.
Paste Unicode or ASCII braille — the input charset is detected and converted automatically.
Review the decoded English, inspect individual cells in the Unicode tab, or download TXT, BRF (for embossers), or printable PNG.

Need English → braille or Grade comparisons? Use thebraille translator. Looking up a single cell? Open the UEB braille alphabet.

Common UEB indicator cells when reading braille

Braille uses prefix indicator cells instead of separate uppercase letters or digits. When decoding a passage back to English, these cells tell the reader (and the liblouis engine) how to interpret the cells that follow.

Cell	Dots	UEB Indicator	What it means in English
⠠	`6`	Capital letter indicator	Capitalizes the single letter immediately following (e.g. `⠠⠁` → `A`).
⠠⠠	`6, 6`	Capital word indicator	Capitalizes the entire word until a space or non-letter terminator (e.g. `⠠⠠⠥⠑⠃` → `UEB`).
⠼	`3456`	Numeric indicator	Switches the following cells `⠁–⠚` into digits `1–0` (e.g. `⠼⠁⠃` → `12`).
⠰	`56`	Grade 1 symbol indicator	Prevents the next cell from being read as a Grade 2 contraction (e.g. `⠰⠃` reads as letter `b`, not `but`).
⠘	`45`	Grade 1 word / prefix	Used in UEB Grade 2 for specific contractions or to switch out of contracted meaning in symbols.

Grade 1 vs. Grade 2 back-translation

If you paste contracted Grade 2 braille while Grade 1 is selected, standalone cells like ⠃ (but), ⠉ (can), or ⠮ (the) will decode literally as single letters or punctuation instead of words. Conversely, pasting uncontracted Grade 1 braille into Grade 2 mode can accidentally expand isolated letters into wordsigns. When a decoded passage looks fragmented, switch grades first and compare both outputs.

Braille to English FAQ

What is the difference between Unicode braille and ASCII braille input?: Unicode braille uses the tactile dot characters U+2800–U+283F (such as ⠓⠑⠇⠇⠕) that display visually on web pages and mobile devices. ASCII braille uses six-dot NABCC keyboard characters (such as hello or ,you can go now4) commonly exported by embosser and note-taker software.
Why are uppercase ASCII letters rejected in NABCC input?: This tool locks its ASCII input to the six-dot subset of text_nabcc.dis, which uses lowercase letters a–z. In NABCC, uppercase letters represent eight-dot computer braille (with dot 7 raised), which falls outside standard six-dot literary UEB. If your source uses uppercase BRF characters, convert them to lowercase or paste Unicode braille instead.
How do I know whether my braille text is Grade 1 or Grade 2?: Look for short single-cell words or multi-letter contractions such as ⠮ (the), ⠯ (and), ⠿ (for), or standalone single letters representing whole words (⠃ for but, ⠽ for you). Most published books, signs, and school worksheets beyond early beginner exercises use Grade 2.
Can I export decoded braille for an embosser or manual slate?: Yes. After converting, use Download BRF for standard uppercase embosser-ready ASCII (with a 34 cells × 25 lines preset), or Download PNG with the Mirrored PNG (slate & stylus) option to print a right-to-left dot guide for manual punching.

Limits for reverse conversion

Bidirectional boundary. Forward (English → braille) on this engine uses UEB tables. Reverse (braille → English) expands contractions where it can, but that step can be ambiguous: the tables include non-reversible rules, so fluent English back is a check against the cells—not proof of a unique decode.
Literary UEB only; six-dot cells; 5,000 code points max.
UEB Grade 2 back-translation can look fluent and still be context-wrong—treat it as a check, not certification.
No OCR from photos or PDFs. Type or paste braille text only.