The National Bank of Ukraine has issued four banknote series since 1996. All banknotes in denominations of â´20, â´50, â´100, â´200, â´500 and â´1,000 issued after 2003 (of the third and fourth series) are considered legal tender. All of them depict an important person in Ukraine's history on the obverse and a landmark place on the reverse. The â´1, â´2, â´5, â´10 denominations are no longer being considered legal tender and are intended to be gradually substituted by coins, though they remain common. There have been four commemorative banknote issues.
In Ukraine's history, banknotes denominated in Ukrainian hryvnias (; ISO 4217 code: UAH, symbol: â´) have been issued during two periods. The first of them took place in 1918 and 1919, when the Central Council of Ukraine decided to transition to hryvnia from karbovanets (), another currency that circulated in various periods of the country's history. In practice, the currencies were interchangeable. It became obsolete as the army of the Ukrainian People's Republic lost control over its claimed territory as a result of the defeat in the Ukrainian War of Independence.
This article covers all hryvnia banknotes issued, or planned to be issued, by government authorities as well as some local issues. Shah () stamps as subdivisions of hryvnia and interest coupons denominated in hryvnias and shahs are covered here because they were also printed on paper.
The second period when Ukrainian hryvnia banknotes appeared was in the times of post-Soviet independence. In 1991âÂÂ1996, karbovanets was circulating in newly independent Ukraine, but the currency experienced hyperinflation. The first post-independence hryvnia banknotes were printed in Canada and Malta in 1992. In September 1996, they entered circulation, following their by hryvnia at a rate of 100,000:1. All issues of hryvnia banknotes that have been printed in 1994 and later were made in Ukraine.
Notes issued in Ukraine, including hryvnia notes, can be viewed at the Museum of Money of the National Bank of Ukraine in Kyiv.
During the later half of 1917, the Central Council of Ukraine sought to gain more autonomy from the Russian Republic, which was ultimately asserted at the Third Universal, establishing the Ukrainian People's Republic (UNR). With the creation of a new state entity, the country's need for its own currency became urgent. In December 1917, the UNR introduced karbovanets as a stopgap measure, until the law of 1 March 1918 installed hryvnia as official currency. The exchange rate was 2 hryvnias to 1 karbovanets issued in 1917. It was defined by law to be convertible to gold at a rate of 1 hryvnia = 8.712 dolya (0.3833 grams, or about 0.012324 oz t). The hryvnia was subdivided into 100 shah.
Since karbovanets currency was circulating at par with the Russian ruble/Soviet ruble until late 1918, it could not be worth more than them, and the rubles were rapidly depreciating. Legislative efforts to limit or outright ban the usage of Russian currencies in Ukraine had limited success. Aggravating the situation was a lack of gold reserves. This meant that the hryvnia was also losing value very quickly. Even though Ukrainian currency was spared from the worst of the hyperinflation, maintaining the gold standard proved unfeasible.
The law of 1 March 1918 envisaged printing denominations of 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1000 hryvnias, which officially called State Credit Notes (). On 24 March 1918, the UNR signed an agreement to print banknotes via the Reichsdruckerei, the German state banknote printer. There were some problems with the contractor. Despite ordering 16,000,000 5-hryvnia notes and 9,000,000 20-hryvnia notes, these were not printed. 50-hryvnia notes were not contracted at all.
All of the submitted designs of Ukrainian hryvnia banknotes were tampered with in Germany, changing colours without the permission of designers or the government. Heorhiy Narbut, who drew the design of the 500-hryvnia note, lamented their poor quality. The Ukrainian State decided to forego 5-hryvnia and 20-hryvnia bills in favour of a new denomination of 2,000 hryvnia, which the Ukrainian government was formally not authorised to issue.
All banknotes contain the following text on the reverse: " ~ ~ ", as mandated by law (later referred to as "State Credit Note notice"). The gold standard notice was also printed, which read: "(One) hryvnia contains 8.712 dolya of pure gold" (). All banknotes had anti-counterfeiting protections, such as a watermark and guilloche pattern.
On 30 March 1918, the Central Council of Ukraine approved a release of 100 million karbovanets worth of State Treasury Notes (). The sum was increased to 500 million karbovanets on 12 May, which was doubled on 9 July 1918. Yakiv Zozulya attributes such rapid increases to a seemingly clientelist agreement with Austria-Hungary and German Empire, whereby Ukraine granted a 200 million karbovanets "unlimited-term loan" to each of these countries. On the other hand, Pavlo Hay-Nyzhnyk said the money was needed to revive the country's economy anyway.
In essence, State Treasury Notes were 4-year treasury bonds issued in denominations of 50, 100, 200 and 1,000 hryvnias. They yielded 3.6% simple interest per annum paid every six months, on 1 July and 2 January. They had a unified design prepared by Heorhiy Narbut, with a roughly square centre, where the value of the bond was written, plus four coupons on either side of the note, worth respectively 0.90, 1.80, 3.60 and 18 hryvnias each. The only feature that was different between each of these bonds was colours. Due to the enormous size of the notes, as well as due to the location of coupons, they were nicknamed "airplanes" ().
The coupons and the notes were not formally intended to be legal tender in the sense that the possibility to redeem them at banks was limited by the dates in coupons. In practice, due to an acute shortage of small change, these pieces of paper were readily cut out and circulated as plain currency. Even government agencies accepted both the notes and the coupons for payments. The coupons and the State Treasury Notes were thus described as "surrogate banknotes".
Shahivky (ÃÂðóÃÂòúø) were named so after shah, the subdivision of hryvnia, and served as small change because of the strong deficit of metals to mint coins. On 18 April 1918, the government authorised to issue paper "coins" of 1, 2, 4, 6, 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 shahiv. The first four denominations have never been issued, nor are they known to have ever been printed. According to various estimates, the other five shahivky accounted for about 24-38 million hryvnia in circulation. Among those issued, the 30 shahiv stamp was rarer than the other denominations.
Shahivky were postage stamp-sized, and they were sometimes used as postage stamps due to the dearth of "real" postage stamps. Unlike the postage staps, which were all imperforate, the five pieces of postage stamp currencies were usually . 40 and 50 shahiv imperforate stamps are known to exist but are much rarer than the perforated versions. The currency was printed on thicker paper than the stamps, and the notice saying that the post stamps "circulate alongside metal coinage" appeared on the reverse, unlike in stamps, where the other side was blank. Due to their weak protections, shahivky were often counterfeited, particularly the top two denominations.
Due to their lightness and their propensity to be blown away by the wind, they earned a tongue-in-cheek nickname of "butterflies" (). They were also known as "postage stamps" () in reference to their size and appearance. The shops of the time were known to give out change in bundles of hundreds of such stamp "coins".
In 1918, the Ukrainian State fell and the name returned to the Ukrainian People's Republic, represented by the Directorate. The new government declared hryvnias to be the "national currency" and tried to de-emphasize the other parallel Ukrainian currency, the karbovanets. However, many more denominations were issued in karbovanets than in hryvnia in 1919. The government only managed to issue a so-called State Treasury Exchange Note () worth 5 hryvnias with a hastily-prepared primitive design. It was printed in Stanislaviv (now Ivano-Frankivsk) and became the only state-sanctioned banknote ever printed on the territory of West Ukrainian People's Republic (ZUNR). The banknotes were mostly circulated in Eastern Galicia.
In 1920, the circulation of the Ukrainian currency was curtailed. In January, the Communists, who controlled most of Ukraine, ordered the banks to stop accepting all money issued by previous Ukrainian governments, including hryvnias, and removed the obligation to accept Ukrainian currency by private parties. At the end of 1920, they forbade circulation of all Ukrainian money. The last known issue of Ukrainian currency in 1917âÂÂ1920 were State Credit Notes, denominated at 50 and 1,000 hryvnias, which were printed in Vienna. Few proofs () of these banknotes are known to exist. They became obsolete before they could be circulated, as Symon Petliura dissolved the Directorate's government in November 1920 because it barely controlled any territory.
Apart from state-issued banknotes, there were also hundreds of local currency paper currency units, notes, coupons etc., issued by municipal authorities. Over 300 municipalities within current Ukrainian borders once issued a total of over 1,500 variously named currency substitutes, mostly rubles, karbovanets and hryvnia. Some of the paper currency denominated in hryvnia is shown in the gallery below.
As Ukraine was nearing independence in 1991, the government of then Ukrainian SSR began preparations to introduce a new currency named hryvnia. In April 1991, Leonid Kravchuk, then leader of the Supreme Soviet of Ukrainian SSR, ordered the preparation of designs for the new national currency. It was initially planned to issue banknotes in denominations of â´1, â´3, â´5, â´10, â´25, â´50, â´100 and â´200, mimicking the denominations of the Soviet ruble. The decision for the design of the currencies was adopted on 11 September 1991. On that day, it was decided to change a planned â´3 note to â´2, and â´25 notes to â´20, as well as to set aside â´200 as a reserve denomination.
It was then that the general outline of banknotes was chosen, with a prominent person from Ukraine's history on the obverse and a landmark building on the reverse, in most cases directly related to the person displayed. The choice of the people portrayed met with some reservations. Kravchuk feared that inclusion of hetman Ivan Mazepa might incense Moscow, as Russians see him as a traitor. The candidacy of historian Mykhailo Hrushevskyi was also politically sensitive, but it was approved and stayed in banknote designs.
The first series was developed by Ukrainian artists Vasyl Lopata and Borys Maksymov, who used relatively uncommon depictions of Taras Shevchenko and the Kievan Rus' rulers. Lopata was drawing the portraits and the buildings, while Maksymov designed the rest of the banknote. Lopata proposed his versions of 500 and 1,000 hryvnias, with Hryhorii Skovoroda or Daniel of Galicia on the former denomination and Petro Mohyla on the latter, but his idea was not supported.
As the preparations for the first series were made, it became apparent that Ukraine lacked appropriate domestic facilities to print banknotes. Therefore, banknotes of the first series of hryvnias were made by the Canadian Bank Note Company. 50, 100 and 200 hryvnias, which made part of the second series, after some problems connected with print quality and delays with the Canadian contractor, were eventually ordered from the Maltese branch of De La Rue, which was also producing karbovanets banknotes until the started operation in 1994.
By the time the banknotes arrived, the economic crisis became so deep and inflation so bad that the government decided to stick with the karbovanets. It was only on 2 September 1996 that the first series of hryvnia banknotes, up to 20 hryvnias, was introduced into circulation by the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU).
In 1996, the 1, 50, and 100 hryvnia notes of the second series were introduced. The 1 hryvnia note was already produced in Ukraine in the brand new printing factory, as would all subsequent banknotes be, while the two higher denominations were still printed by De La Rue. They had better security features in comparison with the first series. Most of the other denominations went into circulation in 1997. The 200 hryvnia note was released in 2001, just before the tenth anniversary of Ukraine's independence.
The second series was quickly found to have several drawbacks, so plans to replace it were approved as early as 1999. Serhiy Tihipko, then governor of the National Bank of Ukraine, noted that 2, 10 and 20 hryvnias were hardly distinguishable from each other. Artists have pointed to several design flaws and inaccuracies in the banknotes. Lopata was, for instance, not happy with the De La Rue banknotes, and the National Bank of Ukraine wanted to introduce new security features. In 2003, the â´20 note became the first banknote of the third series of the Ukrainian hryvnia. Other denominations quickly followed suit. It was also then that the â´500 bills, which became among the most common banknotes in Ukraine, were introduced into circulation.
Refurbished versions of these banknotes, with even more anti-counterfeiting techniques, were released starting from 2014 (â´100), followed by â´500 regular issue and a â´20 commemorative note in 2016, â´20 regular bill in 2018 and the rest of the banknotes, including the new â´1000, in 2019 and early 2020.
All descriptions taken from the site of the National Bank of Ukraine.
Since October 2020, all banknotes from the first and the second series were withdrawn from circulation and are only exchanged in banks. All banknotes of the third and fourth series remain legal tender. However, banknotes from â´1 to â´10, which have already been gradually withdrawn in favour of coins of the same denominations, will lose legal tender status on 2 March 2026. Other third-series banknotes are being replaced with the newest, fourth-series banknotes. The banknotes generally use cotton as a substrate, but the â´1000 banknote includes 20% linen fibres. The usage of linen was pioneered in the â´20 commemorative banknote issued in 2016.
As of 1 January 2026, there were almost 2.64 billion notes in circulation, worth about â´917 billion. About a quarter of notes are worth â´500. Almost a fifth are worth â´1000, and their share is rapidly rising. â´200 notes are fairly common, but their amount more than halved since the peak in March 2022. Despite circulating alongside big 1 hryvnia coins and, since 2018, new smaller coins, there is still a large amount of â´1 notes in circulation. However, there are now more coins in each denomination up to â´10 than there are banknotes. â´20, â´50 and â´100 are also relatively rare compared with other denominations.
The detected number of counterfeit hryvnia banknotes was hovering around 5 forged bills per 1 million genuine ones in 2024. Forgery levels dipped in 2022-2023, which was attributed to the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The vast majority of counterfeit bills (78%) were the third-series â´500 bills; most other forgeries concerned third-series â´200 notes.
All descriptions taken from the site of the National Bank of Ukraine.