ISMN (International Standard Music Number)

The ISMN (International Standard Music Number) is used to identify printed music publications. The ISMN was conceived in 1993 for the music market, based on the International Standard Book Number (ISBN), and is now used internationally. If it is unclear whether a publication is a book or a music publication, it can be assigned both an ISBN and an ISMN.

An ISMN always has ten digits and is structured as follows:

• The ISMN begins with the prefix M, which identifies the number as an ISMN. The prefix M is automatically generated by ActiveBarcode. You do not need to enter it.
• The following number block identifies the publisher. This publisher ID can be between three and seven digits long.
• This is followed by the product ID. This can be between one and five digits long. The two-digit blocks of the publisher and product IDs always add up to eight digits. If the publisher ID is three digits long, the product ID is always five digits long.
• The final digit of the ISMN is the check digit. This is calculated using the modulo 10 method. For prefix M, the value 3 is used.

To print a barcode for an ISMN, an EAN 13 code is used, which begins with a special combination of digits. An ISMN barcode is therefore a special form of the EAN-13 code. The prefix M is coded as 0 in this case.

You can get further information on how to obtain an ISMN publisher ID directly from The International ISMN Agency.

More information about this can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISMN.

Technical data

Valid characters:	1234567890
Length:	10
Check digit:	Calculated according to Modulo 10 ActiveBarcode calculates the check digit automatically.
Type#:	ISMN - #41 - CODEISMN