Which Bank Is This IBAN?

How to Identify a Polish Bank from an IBAN

Every Polish bank account number contains an 8-digit sort code issued by the National Bank of Poland ¹. If you have received a Polish IBAN on an invoice, contract, or transfer request, those digits tell you which bank holds the account. The tool above does this automatically: paste the IBAN or the 26-digit account number, and it reads the sort code, names the bank, and returns the BIC/SWIFT code.

You can also decode an IBAN by hand. Positions 3 through 10 of a Polish IBAN hold the 8-digit sort code (numer rozliczeniowy). The first four digits identify the bank; the next three identify the branch; the eighth is a check digit calculated with a modulo 10 formula ¹. Match those first four digits against the directory below to find the bank.

The tool names every bank registered in the NBP directory, all 706 institutions, and returns the BIC/SWIFT code for each one that publishes a BIC. The banks listed below are the ones you will meet most often, but the tool also recognizes cooperative banks, credit unions, and branches of foreign banks. For any valid Polish IBAN it extracts and formats the sort code and account number as well.

Polish Bank Directory: Sort Codes and BIC/SWIFT

The first four digits of a Polish sort code identify the bank. The table below lists Poland’s most common banks with their sort code prefix and BIC/SWIFT code. It is a quick reference, not the full list: the tool itself recognizes every one of the 706 bank codes in the NBP registry. These are the same values the tool returns when you paste a matching IBAN.

Paste a full IBAN into the tool above to confirm the bank, sort code, and account number in one step. A prefix that is not in this short list still resolves in the tool: it names the cooperative bank (bank spółdzielczy), credit union (SKOK), payment institution, or foreign bank branch the account belongs to ². The complete directory is the NBP’s EWIB 2.0 registry at ewib.nbp.pl, which this tool is built from ³.

Polish IBAN Format

Polish IBANs follow the ISO 13616 standard ⁴. The Poland bank account number format is 28 characters long: the country code “PL”, two check digits, and a 26-digit domestic account number called the NRB (Numer Rachunku Bankowego) ^{1 5}.

Poland IBAN Example

A Polish IBAN looks like this: PL61 1090 1014 0000 0712 1981 2874.

“PL” is the country code. “61” is the IBAN check digit pair. The sort code is 10901014: bank identifier 1090 (Santander Bank Polska), branch 1014. The remaining 16 digits are the individual account serial number.

If someone gives you a 26-digit number without the “PL” prefix, that is the NRB. Add “PL” to the front to get the full IBAN ⁵. Your bank’s online portal will typically show both formats.

Here is how each segment of a Polish IBAN breaks down:

Positions 5 through 14 together form the 8-digit sort code. The IBAN format Poland uses is fixed at 28 characters. Any Polish IBAN that is shorter or longer is malformed.

What Is a Bank Sort Code?

A bank sort code (numer rozliczeniowy) is an 8-digit identifier ^{1 6}. The National Bank of Poland (NBP) issues one to every bank, credit union, and payment institution in its clearing system. It is the Polish equivalent of a UK sort code or a US routing number, and it sits inside every Polish account number.

When you send a domestic transfer through ELIXIR or Express ELIXIR, the clearing system reads the sort code to route the payment to the correct bank and branch ⁷. The first four digits identify the institution; the next three identify the branch; the eighth is a check digit ¹. NBP maintains the full directory of active sort codes in a public registry called EWIB 2.0 ³.

Find BIC/SWIFT Code from an IBAN

Every bank in the directory above also has a BIC/SWIFT code. BIC (Bank Identifier Code) is an international standard defined by ISO 9362 ⁸. You need it when receiving an international wire or setting up a payment to Poland from outside the SEPA zone.

A standard BIC is 8 characters: four letters for the bank, two for the country (PL for Poland), and two for the location. An 11-character version adds a three-letter branch suffix ⁸. The tool returns the 8-character head-office BIC, for example BPKOPLPW for PKO Bank Polski and BREXPLPW for mBank.

This tool works as a BIC finder from IBAN. Paste any Polish account number and, where the bank publishes a BIC, it returns the matching BIC/SWIFT code alongside the bank name ³. Since February 2016, BIC is no longer required for SEPA credit transfers within the EU; IBAN alone is enough for euro payments across the Single Euro Payments Area ⁹. Banks outside the SEPA zone still require the BIC.

Sending Money to a Polish Bank Account

If you are paying someone in Poland from abroad, you need their full 28-character IBAN (with the “PL” prefix) and, for non-SEPA transfers, the bank’s BIC/SWIFT code ^{9 5}. Paste their IBAN into the tool above to confirm the bank name and pull the BIC/SWIFT in one step before you send.

Some banks also ask for the bank’s name and address. The bank name from the tool, plus the BIC, covers what most transfer forms require.

For transfers in currencies other than EUR (for example, USD or GBP), the sending bank may route the payment through a correspondent bank. The recipient’s bank lists its correspondent bank details for each currency on its website or in online banking. The tool on this page returns the direct BIC for the account-holding bank, not the correspondent.

Frequently Asked Questions