This list contains acronyms, initialisms, and pseudo-blends that begin with the letter R.
For the purposes of this list:
- acronym = an abbreviation pronounced as a series of constituent letters, e.g., SARS = severe acute respiratory syndrome
- initialism = an abbreviation pronounced wholly or partly using the names of its constituent letters, e.g., CD = compact disc
- pseudo-blend = an abbreviation whose extra or omitted letters means that it cannot stand as a true acronym, initialism, or portmanteau (a word formed by combining two or more words).
- (a) = acronym in the example: SARS - (a) Severe acute respiratory syndrome
- (i) = initialism in the example: CD - (i) Compact disc
- (p) = pseudo-blend in the example: UNIFEM - (p) United Nations Development Fund for Women
- (s) = symbol (none of the above, representing and pronounced as something else; for example: MHz - Megahertz)
Add new entries here or in the sub-pages
Please add your own entries, in this page or in the appropriate sub-page. Use a quasi-dictionary order, with lowercase treated the same as uppercase and ignoring non-alphanumeric characters (hyphens and such). This means that only alphanumeric characters have any significance in determining order, and that lowercase letters occupy the same ordering position as uppercase (in tie-breaker cases, list lower case first). For example: Ka appears before KA. (This differs from a strict ASCII ordering.)
(Main list of acronyms and initialisms)
Contents: | Top - R0–9 RA RB RC RD RE RF RG RH RI RJ RK RL RM RN RO RP RQ RR RS RT RU RV RW RX RY RZ |
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- R - (i) Reinforcing - Right - (s) Röntgen - (i) Restricted (movie rating)
R0-9
- R0-99 - (i) R-value (insulation)
- R2I - (i) Resistance to Interrogation
- R3P - (i) Rearm, Refuel, and Resupply Point
RA
- Ra - (s) Radium
- RA - (a) Radio Australia
- RA - (s) Rain (METAR Code) - (i) Rear Area - Reinforced Alert - Republican Army - Right Ascension - Royal Artillery (UK) - Royal Academy
- RAA - (a) Royal Automobile Association - South Australia - (i) Rear Assembly Area
- RAAF - (i) Royal Australian Air Force
- Rabobank – (p) Raiffeisen-Boerenleenbank (from the two banks that merged to form the modern company)
- RAC - (i) Royal Automobile Club (in the United Kingdom, renamed RAC plc in 2002)
- RACK - (a) Risk Aware Consensual Kink (SM phrase)
- Racon - (p) RAdar beaCON
- RADA - (a) Royal Academy of Dramatic Art
- Radar - (p) RAdio Detection And Ranging
- RADB - (i) Real America Database - Resource Assessment Database - Reunion Address DataBase - Rice Allelopathy Data Base - Routing Arbiter Data Base
- RADb - (i) Routing Assets Data Base
- RadB - (s) Rad51/Dmc1 homologous protein
- RADC - (i) Region Air Defence Commander
- RAE - (i) UK Royal Aircraft Establishment (–1991)
- RAF - (i) Red Army Faction - Royal Air Force
- RAG - (a) Raising and Giving - Rocket Antitank Grenade
- RAGBRAI – (a) Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa
- RAM - (a) Random Access Memory - Rolling Airframe Missile - Royal Air Maroc
- Ramark - (p) RAdar MARKer
- RAOC - (i) Rear Area Operation Centre
- RAP - (a/i) Radio Access Point - Radiological Assistance Program (U.S. Department of Energy) - Rear Area Protection - Recognised [Operating/Operational] Air Picture - Recurring Advance Payment - Relational Associative Processor - Reliable Acoustic Path - Rocket-Assisted Projectile - Rule Against Perpetuities
- RARDE - (a) UK Royal Armament Research and Development Establishment (1962–1991)
- RARE - (a) Rapid Aqcuisition with Relaxation Enhancement (MRI technique)
- RASC - (a) Royal Army Service Corp - Former corps of British Army
- RATELO - (p) Radiotelephone Operator
RB
- Rb - (s) Rubidium
- RB - (i) Running Back (football)
- R&B - (i) Rhythm and Blues
- RBAR - (i) Row By Agonizing Row - a derogatory way of describing a technique of scanning a set of records in a database to update or examine the contents of each one. This is the technique of last resort in most cases, since most database operations are optimized when using set based analysis instead of the RBAR method.
- RBCI - (i) Radio Based Combat Identification
- RBI - (i) Runs Batted In
- RBOC - (a/i) Regional Bell Operating Company ("Baby Bell")
RC
- RC - see entry
- RCA - (i) Radio Corporation of America - Root Cause Analysis - Royal Canadian Artillery - Royal City Avenue (famous entertainment zone in Thailand)
- RCAF - (i) Royal Canadian Air Force
- RCAR - (a) Research Council for Automobile Repairs ("are-car")
- RCC - (i) Rescue Co-ordination Centre
- RCCO - (i) Royal Canadian College of Organists
- RCHA - (i) Royal Canadian Horse Artillery (regiment)
- RCMP - (i) Royal Canadian Mounted Police
- RCRA - (a) Resource Conservation and Recovery Act ("reck-ra" or "rick-ra")
- RCS - (i) Radar Cross-Section - Revision Control System - Reaction Control System
- RCT - (i) Randomized Controlled Trial - Robotically Controlled Telescope
- RCZ - (i) Rear Combat Zone
RD
- R&D - (i) Research & Development
- RD - Radio Disney
- RDA - (i) Research, Development, and Acquisition - Recommended Daily Allowance (Nutrition)
- RDD - (i) Radiological Dispersion Device
- RDDL - (a/i) Resource Directory Description Language ("riddle")
- RDECOM - (p) (U.S. Army) Research, Development and Engineering Command
- RDM - (i) Remotely Delivered/Deliverable Mine
- RDO - (i) Rapid, Decisive Operation(s) - Regular Day Off - Remote Data Objects
- RDT - (i) Remote Digital Terminal
- RDTE or RDT&E - (i) Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation
- RDV - (i) Remote Detection Vehicle
RE
- Re - (s) Rhenium
- RE - (s) Royal Engineers
- REACH - (p) Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemical Substances
- REACT - (a) Remote Electronically Activated Control Technology
- REAM - (a) Retired Educators Association of Minnesota
- RECCE - (a) Reconnaissance
- REEF - (a) Reef Environmental Education Foundation
- REM - (i/a) Rapid Eye Movement (sleep phase) - Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum
- REME - (a) Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers
- RERC - (i) Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center
- RES - (i) Radiation Exposure Status - (p) Reserve
- RESNA - (a) Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America
- REU - (s) Réunion (ISO 3166 trigram)
RF
- Rf - (s) Rutherfordium
- RF - (i) Radio Frequency - Receptive Field (neurophysiology)
- RFA - (i) Restrictive Fire Area (military) - Royal Field Artillery
- RFC - (i) Request for Comments - Royal Flying Corps (WWI precursor to RAF)
- RFE - (i)
- RFEF - (i) Real Federación Española de Fútbol (Spanish for Royal Spanish Football Federation)
- RFI - (i) Ready For Inspection - Ready For Issue - Request For Information - Radio Frequency Interference
- RFID - (p) Radio Frequency IDentification
- RFL - (i) Restrictive Fire Line (military)
RG
- Rg - (s) Roentgenium
- RG - (i) Republican Guard
- RGB - (i) Red Green Blue (colour model)
- RGBI - (i) Red Green Blue Intensity (ditto)
RH
- Rh - (s) Rhodium
- RH - (s) Southern Rhodesia (ISO 3166 digram; obsolete 1980)
- RHIC - (i) Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider
- RHLI - (i) Royal Hamilton Light Infantry (Canadian militia regiment)
- RHO - (s) Southern Rhodesia (ISO 3166 trigram; obsolete 1980)
- RHS - (i) Right Hand Side - Redland High School - (a) Royal Horticultural Society - London
- RHU - (i) Replacement Holding Unit
- RHWR - (i) Radar Homing and Warning Receiver ("raw" for short)
RI
- RI - (s) Rex et Imperator, Regina et Imperatrix King-Emperor
- RI - (s) Rhode Island (postal symbol)
- RIAA - (i) Recording Industry Association of America
- RIBA - (a) Royal Institute of British Architects
- RIF - (i) Reduction In Force (layoffs) - Resistance Index for Frostbite - Reading Is Fundamental
- RILA - (a) Retail Industry Leaders Association
- RIMVS - (i) Retinal Imaging Machine Vision System
- RIP - (a/i) Relief In Place - (i) requiesca[n]t in pace (Latin for "may he/she/they rest in peace")
- RIS - (i) Range Instrumentation System
- RISC - (i) Reduced Instruction Set Computer
- RISD - (p) Rhode Island School of Design ("riz-dee")
- RISTA - (a) Reconnaissance, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition (see also ISTAR)
- RWH - (a) Rain Water Harvesting
RJ
- RJD - (i) Reduced Julian Day
RK
- RKBA - Right to Keep and Bear Arms (Second Amendment to the United States Constitution)
- RKI - (i) Robert Koch Institute, German governmental research institute in Berlin
- RKO - (i) Radio-Keith-Orpheum Pictures
RL
- RL - (i) Release Line - Real Life
- RLP - (i) Recognised [Operating/Operational] Land Picture
- RLS - (i) Restless Leg Syndrome
- RLY - (p) Rally Point
RM
- RM - see separate disambiguation page
- rm - (s) Raeto-Romansh language (ISO 639-1 code)
- RMA - (i) Return Mailing Authorization - Revolution in Military Affairs
- RMC - (i) Royal Military College (Australia, Canada, UK)
- RMDA - (i) Records Management and Declassification Agency
- RMP - (i) Recognised [Operating/Operational] Maritime Picture
- RMS - (i) Rate-Monotonic Scheduling - Richard M. Stallman - Root-Mean-Square - Royal Mail Ship (e.g. RMS Titanic)
RN
- rn - (s) Kirundi language (ISO 639-1 code)
- Rn - (s) Radon -
- RN - (a) Radio Netherlands
- RN – (i) Royal Navy - Registered Nurse (USA)
- RNA - (i) RiboNucleic Acid
- RNAD - Royal Naval Armaments Depot (UK)
- RNPS - (i) Radio Network Planning System
- RNZ - (a) Radio New Zealand
- RNZI - (a) Radio New Zealand International
RO
- ro - (s) Romanian language (ISO 639-1 code)
- RO - (i) Range Only - Red Orchestra - (s) Romania (ISO 3166 and FIPS 10-4 country code digram)
- ROA - (a/i) Rate Of Ascent
- ROC - (i) Receiver Operating Characteristic (statistics) - Regional Operations Centre - Republic Of China - Roc-A-Fella Records
- ROCV or ROC-V - (i) Recognition Of Combat Vehicles ("rock-vee")
- ROD - (a/i) Rate Of Descent - Record Of Decisions - Report Of Discrepancy
- ROE - (i) Rules Of Engagement
- roh - (s) Raeto-Romansh language (ISO 639-2 code)
- ROH - (i) Ring of Honor
- ROI - (i) Return On Investment,Republic of Ireland.
- ROFL(MAO) - (i) Rolling On the Floor Laughing (My Ass Off)
- ROFLOL - (i) Rolling On the Floor Laughing Out Loud
- ROK - (a/i) Republic of Korea
- ROL - (s) Romanian leu (ISO 4217 currency code)
- ROM - (a) Read-Only Memory - Refuel On the Move - Royal Ontario Museum
- ron - (s) Romanian language (ISO 639-2 code)
- RON - (s) Romanian new leu (ISO 4217 currency code)
- ROP - (i) Render Output Pipeline
- RORO OR ro-ro - (a) Roll-On/Roll-Off (ferry)
- ROS - (i) Reactive Oxygen Species
- ROTC - (i) Reserve Officer Training Corps ("Rawt-Cee")
- ROU - (s) Romania (ISO 3166 trigram)
- ROV - (i) Remotely Operated Vehicle
- ROW - (i) Right Of Way - Rest Of the World
- ROWPU - (a) Reverse Osmosis Water Purification Unit ("roe-pew")
- ROZ - (a/i) Restricted Operations Zone
RP
- RP - (s) Philippines (FIPS 10-4 country code) - (i) Release Point - Role-Playing
- RPA - (i) Regional Plan Association
- RPD - (i) Recognition-Primed Decision-making
- RPF - (i) Rwandan Patriotic Front
- RPG - (i) (US-CA) Regional Planning Group - Report Program Generator - Rocket Projectile Gun - Rocket-Propelled Grenade - Role-Playing Game
- RPL - (i) Reverse Polish Lisp
- rpm - (s) revolutions per minute
- RPM - (i) Red Hat Package Manager
- RPN - (i) reverse Polish notation
- RPO - (i) Radiation Protection Officer - (i) Regular Production Option
- RPR-FOM - (i/a) Realtime Platform Reference Federation Object Model ("reaper fomm")
- rps - (s) revolutions per second
- RPV - (i) Remotely Piloted Vehicle
RQ
- RQ - (s) Puerto Rico (FIPS 10-4 territory code)
RR
- R&R - (i) Rest & Relaxation
- RRB - (i) Railroad Retirement Board
- RRN - (i) Recurrence Rate Number
- RRP - (i) Recurrent Respiratory Papillomatosis
- RRS - (i) Racing Rules of Sailing
- RRSP - (i) Registered Retirement Savings Plan (Canada; roughly equivalent to the IRA in the U.S.)
RS
- RS - (s) Russia (FIPS 10-4 country code)
- R&S - (i) Reconnaissance & Surveillance
- R/S - (i) Respectfully Submitted
- RSA - (i) Regimental Support Area - Republic of South Africa - (i) Rivest-Shamir-Adleman encryption
- RSD - (i) Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy - (s) Serbian dinar (ISO 4217 currency code)
- RSI - (i) Repetitive Strain Injury
- RSJ - (i) Rolled Steel Joist (construction)
- RSN - (i) Real Soon Now (coined by author Jerry Pournelle)
- RSPB - (i) (UK) Royal Society for the Protection of Birds
- RSPCA - (i) Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
- RSR - (i) Required Supply Rate
- RSRE - (i) UK Royal Signals and Radar Establishment (1976–1991)
- RSS - (i) Really Simple Syndication
- RSTA - (i) Reconnaissance, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition
- RSVP - (i) répondez s'il vous plaît (French for "please reply")
RT
- RT - (i) Real Time - Radio Telephone - (p) Return to duty
- RTA - (i) Road traffic accident (British)
- RTBF - (i) Radio-Télévision belge de la Communauté française
- RTCA - (i) RTCA, Inc.
- RTÉ - (i) Radio Telefís Éireann
- RTF - (i) Rich Text Format
- RTFM - (i) Read the Fucking/Fine Manual
- RTG - (i) Radio-isotope Thermoelectric Generator also used for Rubber Tyred Gantry crane
- RTGS - (a) Royal Thai General System of Transcription - Real Time Gross Settlement
- RTI - (i) Run-Time Infrastructure (Simulation)
- RTL - see entry
- RTLS - (a) Return to Launch Site - period in NASA Space Shuttle assent profile where, during assent, shuttle aborts assent and turns and glides back to landing strip at launch site
- RTP - (i) Real-time Transport Protocol
- RT-PCR - (i) Real Time Polymerase Chain Reaction or Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction. Clarified with Real Time RT-PCR or Reverse Transcriptase RT-PCR where appropriate.
- RTS - see entry
- RTT - (i) Round Trip Timing
- RTV - (i) Rapid Terrain Visualization ACTD
RU
- ru - (s) Russian language (ISO 639-1 code)
- Ru - (s) Ruthenium
- RU - (s) Russia (ISO 3166 digram)
- RUB - (s) Russian ruble (ISO 4217 currency code)
- RUC - (i) Royal Ulster Constabulary
- run - (s) Kirundi language (ISO 639-2 code)
- rus - (s) Russian language (ISO 639-2 code)
- RUS - (s) Russia (ISO 3166 trigram)
- RUSI - (p) Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies
RV
- RV - (i) Reconnaissance Vehicle - Recreational Vehicle - Re-entry Vehicle
RW
- rw - (s) Kinyarwanda language (ISO 639-1 code)
- RW - (s) Rwanda (ISO 3166 and FIPS 10-4 country code digram)
- RWA - (s) Rwanda (ISO 3166 trigram)
- RWADA - (a) Resident Weighted Average Daily Attendance (New York State term used in public education to indicate the size of a school district, i.e its number of students)
- RWF - (s) Rwandan franc (ISO 4217 currency code)
- RWR - (i) Radar Warning Receiver
- RWS - (i) Remote Weapon Station
RX
- Rx - (s) Medical prescription (possibly from Latin "recipere", "to take": see entry)
- RX - (s) Receive
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