How Swiss addresses are structured
A Swiss address looks simple, but it stacks four different systems that are easy to confuse: the canton, the municipality, the locality and the postal code. Each is run by a different authority for a different reason, and they do not line up neatly. Knowing which is which is the difference between "I live in 8006" and "I live in the municipality of Zürich."
Here is the hierarchy, from the largest unit to the smallest, with today's live count at each level:
| Level | What it is | Example | How many |
|---|---|---|---|
| Canton | The 26 member states of the Confederation. | Zürich | 26 |
| Municipality (Gemeinde) | The political community that governs and taxes — the real administrative unit. | Zürich | 2'123 |
| Locality (Ortschaft) | A named postal town, which can straddle several municipalities. | Zürich | 3'961 |
| Postal code (PLZ) | A Swiss Post routing number for delivery — not an administrative area. | 8001 | 3'190 |
Read from the top down. Switzerland is divided into 26 cantons. Those cantons contain 2'123 municipalities (Gemeinden) — the political bodies that actually govern, register residents and levy taxes. Sitting inside and sometimes across those municipalities are 3'961 named localities (Ortschaften), the postal towns you write on an envelope. Laid over all of it are 3'190 postal codes, which belong to Swiss Post and follow delivery routes rather than political borders.
Which level answers which question
- Who governs and taxes you? The municipality — the real administrative unit.
- Whose law and courts apply? The canton.
- What do you write on the envelope? The locality name and the postal code.
- How does the post office sort the mail? The postal code alone.
The reason people get this wrong is that the four systems overlap instead of nesting cleanly. A postal code is not a municipality, and a locality is not a municipality either. One postal code can be shared by several municipalities, and a single municipality can hold several postal codes — the topic of why a postal code is not a municipality.
And because municipalities merge and get renamed over the years, the only identifier that never moves is neither the name nor the postal code but the BFS number — the key behind every figure on this site.