There are now more than 1.7 million postcodes across the UK, covering 27 million addresses. Postcoded letters are read by Royal Mail‘s machinery and sorted 30 times faster than those dealt with by hand. The first postcodes were introduced in Norwich in 1959, using the letters NOR, before being rolled out across the UK in the 1960s.
The first steps towards the modern day postcode were taken in 1857 when Sir Rowland Hill, inventor of the postage stamp, introduced a scheme to accelerate mail delivery. This divided the capital into 10 separate postal districts - N, S, E, W, NE, NW, SE, SW, EC and WC. The public were then asked to add these district letters to the bottom of written addresses, to help speed up delivery.
