Ranks and insignia of NATO

Ranks and insignia of NATO affiliated nations are combined military ranks and insignia used by the member countries (and other affiliated nations) of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

The rank scale is used for specifying posts within NATO.

Rank codes by STANAG 2116 / APersP-01[edit]

NATO maintains a "standard rank scale" which is also known as a "standardized reference system" in an attempt to standardize NATO codes of rank for military personnel and indicate correspondence with nations ranks.^[1] The NATO rank reference code categories were established in a 1978 document entitled STANAG 2116 (formally titled NATO Codes for Grades of Military Personnel). The current 7th edition dated January 13, 2021 (supersedes Edition 6, dated February 25, 2010) is just the cover, and the core of the standard is in APersP-01, Edition A^[1].

NATO rank codes are not the same as military ranks (eg private, corporal,, captain...) nor military pay grades (eg the US military E-1, W-1, CW-5, O-1e, O-10, etc.). They are rank codes that allow for interoperability among NATO member nations.

Officer rank codes[edit]

OF-1 – OF-10 (lowest rank code to highest) are used for commissioned officers:^[2]

OF-6 – OF-10: General officers
OF-3 – OF-5: Senior officers
OF-1 – OF-2: Junior officers

In US Forces the Warrant Officer is a separate and distinct category of officers. This officer rank and precedence is below those of officer personnel, but above that of non-officer personnel, therefore has a special group of codes (W-1 – W-5).^[3]

In British Armed Forces and Canadian Armed Forces warrant officers are the highest other ranks.^[4]

Other rank codes[edit]

OR1–OR9 (lowest rank code to highest) are used for other ranks / enlisted ranks and non-commissioned officers (NCO) :^[2]

OR-5 – OR-9: Non-commissioned officers (for NATO purposes)
OR-1 – OR-4: other ranks/enlisted ranks (usually)

At the same time, OR-4 and OR-3 in some armed forces are known as non-commissioned officers for example: in British Armed Forces are called Senior NCOs are OR-5 to OR-7 and Junior NCOs (eg corporals) are in OR-3 and OR-4.^[5]

This is not a new feature: it was present in previous editions of STANAG 2116, but was sometimes overlooked^{[citation needed]}.

Comparison to US system[edit]

The numbers in the system broadly correspond to the U.S. uniformed services pay grades, with OR-x replacing E-x. The main difference is in the commissioned officer ranks, where the US system recognises two ranks at OF-1 level (O-1 and O-2), meaning that all O-x numbers after O-1 are one point higher on the US scale than they are on the NATO scale (e.g. a major is OF-3 on the NATO scale and O-4 on the US scale).

Officer ranks
Rank group	General / flag officers										Senior officers						Junior officers								Officer cadet
NATO code	OF-10		OF-9		OF-8		OF-7		OF-6		OF-5		OF-4		OF-3		OF-2		OF-1						OF(D)						Student officer
Uniformed services pay grade	Special grade		O-10		O-9		O-8		O-7		O-6		O-5		O-4		O-3		O-2			O-1			Officer candidate/Cadet

Other ranks
Rank group	Non-commissioned officers																						Enlisted
NATO code	OR-9						OR-8		OR-7		OR-6						OR-5						OR-4				OR-3		OR-2						OR-1
Uniformed services pay grade	Special			E-9			E-8		E-7		E-6						E-5						E-4				E-3		E-2						E-1

Use of NATO rank codes outside NATO[edit]

Based on the intentions of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as Ukraine, to join NATO, NATO codes for military ranks have been officially introduced in these countries. Bosnia and Herzegovina did so by adopting a corresponding law in 2005.^[6] In Ukraine, the introduction of NATO codes for military ranks took place in two stages. Firstly in 2020, the Ukrainian parliament amended the structure of military ranks^[7] which was followed in January 2021, by the Minister of Defense of Ukraine approving the compliance of military ranks with NATO codes by order^[8] though the order had a confidential status.^[9].

Such European countries as Austria^[10] and Ireland (a NATO partner)^[11] use NATO rank codes to as an approximation for comparison with NATO forces^[10], or it is unclear whether some official source was used to compile the correspondence.

Officer ranks and criteria for them[edit]

The lack of clear criteria in STANAG 2116, according to which a particular code corresponds to a particular position, leads to errors in interpreting this standard. First of all, this applies to countries that are NATO partners and therefore are not reflected in the standard. A good example is the lack of consensus on the equivalence of non-commissioned officer ranks in the Israel Defense Forces with those in the US Army.^[12]^[13]^[14] This problem is related to the fact that the ranks of IDF unserial officers do not depend on the position held, but on length of service, so their relationship with NATO codes is a debatable issue. Each of the above points of view has its own comments, which are given in the corresponding comments to the sources. The most widely disseminated point of view was that of the professor Asher Shafrir^[15]^[16], although he is a linguist and not a military specialist. The Dictionary of Acronyms in Foreign Armies^[14] is closer to the truth, but because it is in Hebrew, its position is currently little known.^{[citation needed]}

It is left to the NATO member state's discretion which positions are held by which OR rank, and whether an NCO may have a rank below OR-5. This means that even within a single country there may be different approaches for different branches of the armed forces. This is especially true for the US armed forces:

In US Army E–5(OR-5) through E–6 (OR-6) are junior NCO; E–7 (OR-7) through E–9 (OR-9) are senior NCO^[17]
In US Marine Corps E-4 (OR-4) and E-5 (OR-5) are NCOs; E-6 (OR-6) through E-9 (OR-9) are Staff NCOs^[18]