This article is about the kind of address that you find or communicate with someone through. Address can also mean public speaking. It can also be used when someone is working on something, or talking about something.

An address (pronounced AD-dress or ad-DRESS) is a way to find or communicate with someone. When someone says address, he or she usually means a postal address or an e-mail address. On forms, it is common to ask for someone's name, address and phone number, so that the person can be found easily.

Postal Address

A postal address is usually the location of someone's house, but sometimes it is the person's Post Office Box. It is the information that is put on a letter to have the letter delivered to a person.

Example (in England):

Mr John Smith

132, My Street,

Bigtown BG23 4YZ

England

In the U.S., it is formatted in this way:

Name

House Number and Street

City, State, Zipcode

Example (in the US):

Mr John Smith

132, My Street,

Kingston, New York 12401

United States

Email Address

An email address is used to send someone an e-mail. It is formatted like this:

name@provider

"name" is the person's name (or username), and "provider" is the person's email provider. For example:

john@gmail.com

horseycrazy@yahoo.com

larry.smith@msn.com

example50150@domain.eu

The "name" part can be made up of any letters or numbers, and a few special characters, but it cannot contain spaces. The "provider" part can be made up of any letters or numbers, but no special characters and no spaces. Some providers may restrict the "name" part in other ways. For example, yahoo does not allow periods ".", and gmail does not allow underscores "_".