All were the 50 page option. Same size. Front Cover is the same. Difference is front cover art. Data page is polycarbonate. Art on visa pages different.

Overall I prefer the look of the epassport over the next gen passport

What do the pages look like now? Do they still scream Americana like the old design?

Just because ICAO standard allows for inclusion of alphanumeric passport numbers doesn’t mean that every system in use and used to enter passport numbers for US passport users is currently programmed to accept the entry of alphabets in addition to numbers into the fields of entry for passport numbers when the US is loaded into the citizenship/nationality/country of issue field.

The ordinary next generation US passports have been issued to people going back into August at the very least, as there are such passports with issue dates from around 37-43 days ago.

Good thing airlines and immigration departments including CBP already handle foreign passports containing alphabet in the number and MRZ on a daily basis.

Some systems used by airlines and the USG earlier this year were not allowing for letters to be loaded when the passport country was loaded as US. And then there are also situations that go beyond just travel where a passport number may be asked for to be entered and yet the system used has a country-based rule that is restrictive based on what the presumed standard was for a country’s passport numbers at the time the software/database was set up. I doubt that this all has been updated already.

Into the 1970s, the US passports had 1 letter + 6 numbers. Perforated cover and first three pages through the book with the 1 Letter + 6 numbers. This kind of transition has happened before. ;). The process was of course far more manual on State’s side then than nowadays, with even the alphanumeric passport number being handwritten and then a manual perforation performed to the FC and the first three pages inside the book. I think even I’ve still got F _ _ _ _ _ _ series passport number passports from up to the middle of the 1970s around. With the transition to next generation passport we go from 9 numbers to 1 letter + 8 numbers.

My Norwegian passport also has an alphanumeric passport number. I realize this thread is about the new US passport, but the point is, the US is not the first country to move to alphanumeric passport numbers.

The ICAO specs requires MRZ to support characters to A-Z, 0-9, and < (and only those characters) including the passport number field. If passport number is less than 9 characters, it must be filled with < to make it 9 characters in length.

Any IT department that added a "US passport number must be numeric" restriction did it on their own accord and has no one to blame but themselves.

Yup - just to add another anecdote, can confirm as well that the Hong Kong passport has had an alphanumeric passport number since the late 1990's.

I am more than passingly familiar with Norwegian passports and a collection of other countries having alphanumeric passport numbers. And I am also more than passingly familiar with US passports having had alphanumeric passport numbers into the mid-1970s (before being phased out for over 40 years) — even posted about that US passport number history a good number of hours before the above response. Now we have gone back to US passports having alphanumeric passport numbers as and with this launch of this “next generation” US passport model. It doesn’t mean all systems out there for loading US passport numbers have necessarily already been updated so as to accept manual entry or even scanned entry of US passport numbers with a letter.

When it comes to adding a system restriction, I wouldn’t be so presumptuous about where any and all “blame” rests or about what constitutes “on their own accord”.

Sometimes these country-related data entry restrictions (blocking alphabets in the number field) for US passport numbers were part of the systems set ups done on the advice of government or based on what government had advised was applicable for US passport numbers at the time when it came to program or adjust what would be allowed or not allowed for entry into the fields. Sometimes they were even restricted by the government’s own employees or government contractors on the direction of higher ups working for or on behalf of the USG.

So those higher ups inserted a requirement when ICAO had none. So, they did it out of of their accord.

But who are talking about here? Airlines? CBP/foreign immigration? International air travel is the primary use case here. Airlines/CBP/foreign immigration have been handling passport with alphabets for a long time.

What are these entities with this problem (is there even an report of this happening) going to do? Have State remove alphabets from passport numbers and recall those passports already in use with alphabets? State will tell them go pound sand and fix your own problem.

This is definitely an off-topic discussion if there even was one as this a hypothetical problem affecting hypothetical entities with a fringe use case involving passports.

No doubt true. Alphanumeric US passport numbers in the 1970s were probably not taken into account when most modern systems were designed, although systems like Sabre do go back that far. But systems that are designed to accept "a passport number" (rather than specifically only a US passport number) would have already run into trouble years ago if they are not ICAO-compliant.

Effective December 27, 2021 passport fees are going up $20. Largely to accommodate the next gen passport.

https://www.federalregister.gov/docu...rity-surcharge

interesting that compensastion costs are going up by 37% when by all appearances the department failed pretty miserably in performance over the last year: "Increases in security-related costs are largely due to a 37 percent increase in compensation costs for passport adjudicators and enhanced printing technology costs..." Perhaps Citibank is getting a raise for pretty much missing all deliverable performance marks? That would be the gubmint way.....

Compensation costs go up a lot with overtime, and I have little doubt that the supply and logistics costs for the blanks and to use the blanks have been rising too this year. Just be glad that the USG isn't using dates in Q4 2021 to get the baselines to determine what the "user fee"-type pricing of this new US passport type should be from the final week of 2021 and for all of 2022. Some may want to hope that the government doesn't start running the baselines for costing of "the next generation" US passports very often, or this "next generation" passport will be case of US passport application costs rising more extremely for ordinary US passport applicants than inflation.

since passport fees are going up by $20 on December 27, will they guarantee NextGen passports for applicants after that date?

(didn't think so, but had to ask anyway.... :) )

are there any passport agencies that only issue NextGen passports for in-person same-day issuance?(for emergencies)

THanks!