RFC 4647 · BEST CURRENT PRACTICE · 2006

Matching of Language Tags

Overview

RFC 4647, “Matching of Language Tags”, is a Best Current Practice document published in September 2006 by A. Phillips, M. Davis. It obsoletes RFC 3066. The canonical text is published by the RFC Editor.

Abstract

This document describes a syntax, called a "language-range", for specifying items in a user's list of language preferences. It also describes different mechanisms for comparing and matching these to language tags. Two kinds of matching mechanisms, filtering and lookup, are defined. Filtering produces a (potentially empty) set of language tags, whereas lookup produces a single language tag. Possible applications include language negotiation or content selection. This document, in combination with RFC 4646, replaces RFC 3066, which replaced RFC 1766. This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the Internet Community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements.

Abstract as published in the RFC, via rfc-editor.org.

What “Best Current Practice” means

Documents the IETF community's recommended operational or procedural practice rather than a protocol specification.

Read this RFC

The canonical text of RFC 4647 is hosted at rfc-editor.org. Available in TXT,HTML.

Relationships to other RFCs
This RFC obsoletes
RFC 3066
Other RFCs from 2006

Who Is Online

In total there are 97 users online: 0 registered, 89 guests and 8 bots.

Most users ever online was 5,555 on 17 Jul 2026, 3:23 am.

Bots: AhrefsBot Applebot Baiduspider Bingbot Other Bot Other Crawler PetalBot SemrushBot

Users active in the past 15 minutes. Total registered members: 372