Reference
The same five shapes, and exactly three differences
Almost every laundry symbol guide silently mixes the European and American systems into one chart, which is why so many of them leave you more confused than you started. The two standards are close relatives. Learn where they part company and you can read either label.
Last updated 26 July 2026
Europe and most of the world use ISO 3758, maintained alongside GINETEX. The United States and Canada use ASTM D5489. Both are built from the same five shapes — tub, triangle, square, iron, circle — in the same order, meaning the same five processes.
They also share the conventions people find hardest. A cross through any symbol prohibits it in both. Bars underneath the tub mean reduced mechanical action in both: no bar is a normal cycle, one bar is reduced, two bars is much reduced. The circle's letters for professional cleaning are the same. The dots on the iron are the same.
So the differences are narrow, and there are three of them.
One: numbers versus dots
This is the difference people actually notice. A European wash tub contains a number — the maximum temperature in degrees Celsius. An American wash tub contains dots.
| Dots | Temperature |
|---|---|
| 1 | 30 °C |
| 2 | 40 °C |
| 3 | 50 °C |
| 4 | 60 °C |
| 5 | 70 °C |
| 6 | 95 °C |
Straightforward enough on its own. The problem is what happens next.
The dot trap. Dots appear in both systems, in three different symbols, on three different scales. In an American wash tub they are wash temperature. In the tumble-dry circle — in both systems — they are dryer heat. On the iron — in both systems — they are maximum soleplate temperature, 110, 150 and 200 °C.
So two dots means 40 °C in a wash tub and 150 °C on an iron. Anyone who learns "dots mean heat" is fine. Anyone who memorises a dot-to-temperature conversion and carries it from one symbol to another is going to melt something.
Two: how natural drying is drawn
Both systems put drying inside a square, and both use a circle within that square for tumble drying, with dots for heat. That part is identical.
Natural drying is where they part. The European set uses straight lines inside the square: a vertical line for line drying, a horizontal line for flat drying, doubled lines for drip drying — hanging the garment soaking wet, without wringing or spinning — and a diagonal stroke in the upper-left corner for drying in the shade.
The North American set draws line drying with a curved stroke instead — a clothesline sagging under the weight of the washing. It reads immediately once you know, and reads as nothing at all if you are looking for a straight line.
The square section of the symbol guide covers the European set in full.
Three: whether words are required at all
The most interesting difference is not drawn on the label. It is about what the law asks for.
The FTC's Care Labeling Rule originally required American care instructions to be given in words. Symbols were not enough. That changed in July 1997, when the FTC granted a conditional exemption allowing ASTM D5489 symbols to be used in place of written terms — initially only if an explanation of the symbols came with the garment, a requirement that has since lapsed. The motivation was practical: harmonising with Canada and Mexico under NAFTA so a single label could serve all three markets.
That history explains something you can see for yourself. American labels frequently carry both symbols and words — "Machine wash cold, tumble dry low" printed alongside the pictograms — because words were the rule for decades and plenty of manufacturers simply never stopped.
Europe went the other way. Care labelling is not legally required in the EU at all; EN ISO 3758 is a voluntary standard, and it is fibre composition that is mandatory. European labels are symbol-only by convention rather than by rule.
Which is a neat inversion. In the United States, symbols are the exception granted to a rule written around words. In Europe, symbols are the convention that grew up filling a rule that was never written.
Japan, and the direction of travel
Japan ran its own system for decades — JIS L 0217, with 22 symbols that matched neither Western standard and confused every visitor who read one.
That ended with JIS L 0001, effective 1 December 2016, which harmonised Japanese care labelling with ISO 3758:2012 and expanded the set from 22 symbols to 41. It was revised again in 2024.
Harmonised means aligned, not identical — the Japanese set is larger than ISO's and keeps some local conventions. But the practical point for a reader is simple: a Japanese garment bought since 2017 will look familiar, and one bought before then may carry symbols that match nothing you recognise.
A note on who owns these symbols
Worth knowing, and rarely mentioned: the care pictograms are trademarks, owned by GINETEX and co-owned with COFREET. ISO standardises them under an agreement with GINETEX rather than owning them outright.
So the symbols are not public-domain clip art, whatever the image search results suggest. Every symbol on this site was drawn from scratch for that reason.
The short version
- Five shapes, same order, same meanings in both systems.
- Crosses and bars work identically. No bar, one bar, two bars — normal, reduced, much reduced.
- Europe writes a number in the tub. America uses dots.
- Dots mean three different scales in three different symbols. Never carry a conversion across.
- Line drying is a straight vertical line in Europe, a curved clothesline in America.
- US symbols have only been allowed instead of words since 1997, which is why American labels often show both.
- Japan joined the ISO system in 2016.
The reason these guides confuse people is that the two systems are too similar to keep straight and too different to merge. Once you know the divergences are three and not thirty, a foreign care label stops being a puzzle — which is the same argument the symbol guide makes about the notation as a whole. Learn the grammar and you never need the chart.