Beware, these holes will shock you. No, literally. You stand a serious chance of electrocution and serious bodily harm if you aren’t careful with these little windows to suffering.
The United States has a pretty basic layout for their plugs, nothing fancy. This outlet is standardized by the National Electrical Manufacturers Association, this layout is used primarily throughout North and South America.
The plug used mainly by Australia is the AS/NZS 3112 plug. It is used by New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga, Solomon Islands, and Papua New Guinea so it’s not just the land down under that uses this interesting scheme. They’ve been plugging these suckers into the wall since 1937, before which they used cane toads soaked in gasoline.
In Thailand they like to use this three-pronged plug. To be fair, one of the plugs is considered an earthing pin, which is just a fancy way of saying that it’s for grounding the current. The plug is similar to the next one on the list but it is definitely not interchangeable.
Israel’s SI 32 is unique to the small country. Before they went to all round pins they used to have two flat and one round, but to comply with other countries plugs they went to three round. This makes it work with the Europlug used in Europe.
This two-pronged plug is referred to as the Europlug. This plug was made primarily to work with most European plugs, hence the name, as it does not have a specific outlet that is only used for the Europlug. The plug is also used throughout the Middle East, most African nations, Asia, and Russia and their former republics.
The plugs used in Denmark are quite possibly the cutest of the plugs. This little guy is smiling and winking, or doing a really good Thom Yorke impression. After the early 90s these plugs have been required to be grounded, so there should be fewer electrical fires in Denmark.
The Italian plug has three round prongs that are laid out in a row. There are different variations of the plug, mostly having to do with the spacing between the prongs. The reason for the variations is the fact that up until the second half of the 20th century electricity used for lamps was at a different voltage than for other electrical appliances.
In Germany they use a basic two-pronged approach to electricity. The plugs are round, which makes the Europlug compatible with their sockets. This is very similar to the French plug, actually they’re identical, but the sockets are different. Just like the Germans to be contradictory.
