Like most countries and territories, Israel has a large number of zip, or postal, codes. Israeli postal codes consist of a series of numerical digits that indicate the specific region and city of a particular address. Postal services use the code to quickly route mail to the intended recipient.
Postal codes in Israel follow a specific pattern that begins in the northern region of the state, with the numbers growing incrementally for each additional area along that path. Israel's postal-code system follows the same type of numbering that is seen in other countries, with one exception. While traditionally following a five-digit system, in 2013 Israel switched to a seven-digit system instead.
While initially making postal codes more confusing, the idea behind the change was to open up the possibility for more addresses. Under the old five-digit system, the postal service was limited to only 100,000 possible codes. Since the change, however, 10 million unique postal codes are now possible. With a growing population of almost eight million citizens, the seven-digit postal-code system was a much-needed change to the addressing system. In order to find the postal code for a particular region or city, the Israeli Post website provides a search tool.
Several areas in Israel experience poor or no postal delivery due to under-equipped postal infrastructure, organization, and lack of personnel following reforms and budget cuts. Residents of some Israeli cities raise complaints of late or nonexistent delivery exacerbated by shutdown post offices and mailboxes.
The Israeli government approved of partial privatization of the Israel Postal Company, among other state-owned companies, through the sale of shares on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. The Israeli government maintains a majority share in the Israel Postal service after privatization of the company.