English numerals

English number words include numerals and various words derived from them, as well as a large number of words borrowed from other languages.

Cardinal numbers

Cardinal numbers refer to the size of a group. In English, these words are numerals.

0zero (nought)10ten  
1one11eleven  
2two12 twelve (a dozen)20twenty (a score)
3three13thirteen30thirty
4four14fourteen40forty (no "u")
5five15fifteen (note "f", not "v")50fifty (note "f", not "v")
6six16sixteen60sixty
7seven17seventeen70seventy
8eight18eighteen (only one "t")80eighty (only one "t")
9nine19nineteen90ninety (note the "e")

If a number is in the range 21 to 99, and the second digit is not zero, one typically writes the number as two words separated by a hyphen.

21twenty-one
25twenty-five
32thirty-two
58fifty-eight
64sixty-four
79seventy-nine
83eighty-three
99ninety-nine

In English, the hundreds are perfectly regular, except that the word hundred remains in its singular form regardless of the number preceding it.

100one hundred
200two hundred
900nine hundred

So too are the thousands, with the number of thousands followed by the word "thousand".

1,000one thousand
2,000two thousand
10,000ten thousand or (rarely used) a myriad, which usually means an indefinitely large number.
11,000eleven thousand
20,000twenty thousand
21,000twenty-one thousand
30,000thirty thousand
85,000eighty-five thousand
100,000one hundred thousand or one lakh (Indian English)
999,000nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand (inclusively British English, Irish English, Australian English, and New Zealand English)
nine hundred ninety-nine thousand (American English)
1,000,000one million
10,000,000ten million or one crore (Indian English)

In American usage, four-digit numbers with non-zero hundreds are often named using multiples of "hundred" and combined with tens and ones: "One thousand one", "Eleven hundred three", "Twelve hundred twenty-five", "Four thousand forty-two", or "Ninety-nine hundred ninety-nine." In British usage, this style is common for multiples of 100 between 1,000 and 2,000 (e.g. 1,500 as "fifteen hundred") but not for higher numbers.

Americans may pronounce four-digit numbers with non-zero tens and ones as pairs of two-digit numbers without saying "hundred" and inserting "oh" for zero tens: "twenty-six fifty-nine" or "forty-one oh five". This usage probably evolved from the distinctive usage for years; "nineteen-eighty-one", or from four-digit numbers used in the American telephone numbering system which were originally two letters followed by a number followed by a four-digit number, later by a three-digit number followed by the four-digit number. It is avoided for numbers less than 2500 if the context may mean confusion with time of day: "ten ten" or "twelve oh four".

Intermediate numbers are read differently depending on their use. Their typical naming occurs when the numbers are used for counting. Another way is for when they are used as labels. The second column method is used much more often in American English than British English. The third column is used in British English but rarely in American English (although the use of the second and third columns is not necessarily directly interchangeable between the two regional variants). In other words, British English and American English can seemingly agree, but it depends on a specific situation (in this example, bus numbers).

Common British vernacularCommon American vernacularCommon British vernacular
"How many marbles do you have?""What is your house number?""Which bus goes to the High Street?"
101"A hundred and one.""One-oh-one."
Here, "oh" is used for the digit zero.
"One-oh-one."
109"A hundred and nine.""One-oh-nine.""One-oh-nine."
110"A hundred and ten.""One-ten.""One-one-oh."
117"A hundred and seventeen.""One-seventeen.""One-one-seven."
120"A hundred and twenty.""One-twenty.""One-two-oh", "One-two-zero."
152"A hundred and fifty-two.""One-fifty-two.""One-five-two."
208"Two hundred and eight.""Two-oh-eight.""Two-oh-eight."
394"Three hundred and ninety-four.""Three-ninety-four.""Three-ninety-four." or "Three-nine-four."

Note: When writing a cheque (or check), the number 100 is always written "one hundred". It is never "a hundred".

In American English, many students are taught not to use the word and anywhere in the whole part of a number, so it is not used before the tens and ones. It is instead used as a verbal delimiter when dealing with compound numbers. Thus, instead of "three hundred and seventy-three", one would say "three hundred seventy-three". Despite this rule, the and is used by some Americans in reading numbers containing tens and ones as an alternative variant. For details, see American and British English differences.

Very large numbers

For numbers above a million, there are three main systems for naming numbers in English (for the use of prefixes such as kilo- for a thousand, mega- for a million, milli- for a thousandth, etc. see SI units):

Number notation Power
notation
Short scale Long scale Indian
(or South Asian) English
1,000,000106 one million one million ten lakh
1,000,000,000109 one billion
a thousand million
one milliard
a thousand million
one hundred crore
(one arab)
1,000,000,000,0001012 one trillion
a thousand billion
one billion
a million million
one lakh crore
(ten kharab)
1,000,000,000,000,0001015 one quadrillion
a thousand trillion
one billiard
a thousand billion
ten crore crore
(one padm)
1,000,000,000,000,000,0001018 one quintillion
a thousand quadrillion
one trillion
a million billion
ten thousand crore crore
(ten shankh)
1,000,000,000,000,000,000,0001021 one sextillion
a thousand quintillion
one trilliard
a thousand trillion
one crore crore crore

The numbers past one trillion in the short scale system, in ascending powers of 1000, are as follows: quadrillion, quintillion, sextillion, septillion, octillion, nonillion, decillion, undecillion, duodecillion, tredecillion, quattuordecillion, quindecillion, sexdecillion, septendecillion, octodecillion, novemdecillion and vigintillion (which is 10 to the 63rd power, or a one followed by 63 zeros). The highest number in this series listed in modern dictionaries is centillion, which is 10 to the 303rd power.[1] The interim powers of one thousand between vigintillion and centillion do not have standardized names, nor do any higher powers, but there are many ad hoc extensions in use. The highest number listed in Robert Munafo's table of such unofficial names[2] is milli-millillion, which was coined as a name for 10 to the 3,000,003rd power.

The googolplex has often been cited as the largest named number in English. If a googol is ten to the one hundredth power, then a googolplex is one followed by a googol of zeros (that is, ten to the power of a googol).[3] There is the coinage, of very little use, of ten to the googolplex power, of the word googolplexplex.

The terms arab, kharab, padm and shankh are more commonly found in old books on Indian mathematics.

Here are some approximate composite large numbers in American English:

Quantity Written Pronounced
1,200,0001.2 millionone point two million
3,000,0003 millionthree million
250,000,000250 milliontwo hundred fifty million
6,400,000,0006.4 billionsix point four billion
23,380,000,00023.38 billiontwenty-three point three eight billion

Often, large numbers are written with (preferably non-breaking) half-spaces or thin spaces separating the thousands (and, sometimes, with normal spaces or apostrophes) instead of commasto ensure that confusion is not caused in countries where a decimal comma is used. Thus, a million is often written 1 000 000.

In some areas, a point (. or ·) may also be used as a thousands' separator, but then, the decimal separator must be a comma.

Specialized numbers

A few numbers have special names (in addition to their regular names):

Combinations of numbers in most sports scores are read as in the following examples:

Naming conventions of Tennis scores (and related sports) are different from other sports.

The centuries of Italian culture have names in English borrowed from Italian:

Multiplicative adverbs

A few numbers have specialised multiplicative numbers (adverbs) which express how many times some event happens:

one time once
two times twice
three times thrice
(largely obsolete)

Compare these specialist multiplicative numbers to express how many times some thing exists (adjectives):

× 1 solitary singular one-off
× 2 double twofold duplicate
× 3 triple threefold triplicate
× 4 quadruple fourfold
× 5 quintuple fivefold
× 6 sextuple, hextuple sixfold
× 7 septuple, heptuple sevenfold
×100 ..... hundredfold

English also has some multipliers and distributive numbers, such as singly.

Other examples are given in the Specialist Numbers.

Negative numbers

The name of a negative number is the name of the corresponding positive number preceded by "minus" or (American English) "negative". Thus −5.2 is "minus five point two" or "negative five point two". For temperatures, North Americans colloquially say "below"—short for "below zero"—so a temperature of −5° is "five below" (in contrast, for example, to "two above" for 2°). This is occasionally used for emphasis when referring to several temperatures or ranges both positive and negative. This is particularly common in Canada where the use of Celsius in weather forecasting means that temperatures can regularly drift above and below zero at certain times of year.

Ordinal numbers

Ordinal numbers refer to a position in a series. Common ordinals include:

0thzeroth or noughth (see below) 10thtenth  
1stfirst11theleventh  
2ndsecond12thtwelfth (note "f", not "v")20thtwentieth
3rdthird13ththirteenth30ththirtieth
4thfourth14thfourteenth40thfortieth
5thfifth15thfifteenth50thfiftieth
6thsixth16thsixteenth60thsixtieth
7thseventh17thseventeenth70thseventieth
8theighth (only one "t")18theighteenth80theightieth
9thninth (no "e")19thnineteenth90thninetieth

Zeroth only has a meaning when counting starts with zero, which happens in a mathematical or computer science context.

Ordinal numbers such as 21st, 33rd, etc., are formed by combining a cardinal ten with an ordinal unit.

21sttwenty-first
25thtwenty-fifth
32ndthirty-second
58thfifty-eighth
64thsixty-fourth
79thseventy-ninth
83rdeighty-third
99thninety-ninth

Higher ordinals are not often written in words, unless they are round numbers (thousandth, millionth, billionth). They are written using digits and letters as described below. Here are some rules that should be borne in mind.

If the units digit is: 0123456789
write this after the number thstndrdthththththth

These ordinal abbreviations are actually hybrid contractions of a numeral and a word. 1st is "1" + "st" from "first". Similarly, "nd" is used for "second" and "rd" for "third". In the legal field and in some older publications, the ordinal abbreviation for "second" and "third" is simply "d".

NB: The practice of using "d" to denote "second" and "third" is still often followed in the numeric designations of units in the US armed forces, for example, 533d Squadron, and in legal citations for the second and third series of case reporters.

Any ordinal name that doesn't end in "first", "second", or "third", ends in "th".

Dates

There are a number of ways to read years. The following table offers a list of valid pronunciations and alternate pronunciations for any given year of the Gregorian calendar.

Year Most common pronunciation method Alternative methods
1 BC (The year) One Before Christ (BC) 1 before the Common era (BCE)
1 (The year) One Anno Domini (AD) of the Common era (CE)
In the year of Our Lord 1
235 Two thirty-five Two-three-five
Two hundred (and) thirty-five
911 Nine eleven Nine-one-one
Nine hundred (and) eleven
999 Nine ninety-nine Nine-nine-nine
Nine hundred (and) ninety-nine
1000 One thousand Ten hundred
1K
1004 One thousand (and) four Ten oh-four
1010 Ten ten One thousand (and) ten
1050 Ten fifty One thousand (and) fifty
1225 Twelve twenty-five One-two-two-five
One thousand, two hundred (and) twenty-five
Twelve-two-five
1900 Nineteen hundred One thousand, nine hundred
Nineteen aught
1901 Nineteen oh-one Nineteen hundred (and) one
One thousand, nine hundred (and) one
Nineteen aught one
1919 Nineteen nineteen Nineteen hundred (and) nineteen
One thousand, nine hundred (and) nineteen
1999 Nineteen ninety-nine Nineteen hundred (and) ninety-nine
One thousand, nine hundred (and) ninety-nine
2000 Two thousand Twenty hundred
Two triple-oh
Y2K
2001 Two thousand (and) one Twenty oh-one
Twenty hundred (and) one
Two double-oh-one
Two oh-oh-one
2009 Two thousand (and) nine Twenty oh-nine
Twenty hundred (and) nine
Two double-oh-nine
Two oh-oh-nine
2010 Twenty ten[7] Twenty hundred (and) ten
two-oh-one-oh
Two thousand (and) ten>

Fractions and decimals

In spoken English, ordinal numbers are also used to quantify the denominator of a fraction. Thus "fifth" can mean the element between fourth and sixth, or the fraction created by dividing the unit into five pieces. In this usage, the ordinal numbers can be pluralized: one seventh, two sevenths. The sole exception to this rule is division by two. The ordinal term "second" can only refer to location in a series; for fractions English speakers use the term 'half' (plural "halves").

Here are some common English fractions (known linguistically as "partitive numerals"):[8]

1/16 one sixteenth
1/10 or 0.1 one tenth
1/8 one eighth
2/10 or 0.2 two tenths
1/4 one quarter or (mainly American English) one fourth
3/10 or 0.3 three tenths
1/3 one third
3/8 three eighths
4/10 or 0.4 four tenths
1/2 one half
6/10 or 0.6 six tenths
5/8 five eighths
2/3 two thirds
7/10 or 0.7 seven tenths
3/4 three quarters or three fourths
8/10 or 0.8 eight tenths
7/8 seven eighths
9/10 or 0.9 nine tenths
15/16 fifteen sixteenths

Alternatively, and for greater numbers, one may say for 1/2 "one over two", for 5/8 "five over eight", and so on. This "over" form is also widely used in mathematics.

Numbers with a decimal point may be read as a cardinal number, then "and", then another cardinal number followed by an indication of the significance of the second cardinal number (mainly U.S.); or as a cardinal number, followed by "point", and then by the digits of the fractional part. The indication of significance takes the form of the denominator of the fraction indicating division by the smallest power of ten larger than the second cardinal. This is modified when the first cardinal is zero, in which case neither the zero nor the "and" is pronounced, but the zero is optional in the "point" form of the fraction.

For example:

In English the decimal point was originally printed in the center of the line (0·002), but with the advent of the typewriter it was placed at the bottom of the line, so that a single key could be used as a full stop/period and as a decimal point. In many non-English languages a full-stop/period at the bottom of the line is used as a thousands separator with a comma being used as the decimal point.

Fractions together with an integer are read as follows:

A space is required between the whole number and the fraction; however, if a special fraction character is used like "½", then the space can be done without, e.g.

Whether to use digits or words

With few exceptions, most grammatical texts rule that the numbers zero to nine inclusive should be "written out" instead of "1" and "2", one would write "one" and "two".[9]

Example: "I have two apples." (Preferred)
Example: "I have 2 apples."

After "nine", one can head straight back into the 10, 11, 12, etc., although some write out the numbers until "twelve".

Example: "I have 28 grapes." (Preferred)
Example: "I have twenty-eight grapes."

Another common usage is to write out any number that can be expressed as one or two words, and use figures otherwise.

Examples:
"There are six million dogs." (Preferred)
"There are 6,000,000 dogs."
"That is one hundred and twenty-five oranges." (British English)
"That is one hundred twenty-five oranges." (US-American English)
"That is 125 oranges." (Preferred)

Numbers at the beginning of a sentence should also be written out, or the sentence rephrased.

The above rules are not always followed. In literature, larger numbers might be spelled out. On the other hand, digits might be more commonly used in technical or financial articles, where many figures are discussed. In particular, the two different forms should not be used for figures that serve the same purpose; for example, it is inelegant to write, "Between day twelve and day 15 of the study, the population doubled."

Empty numbers

"Out of the Mud" flyer.

Colloquial English has a small vocabulary of empty numbers that can be employed when there is uncertainty as to the precise number to use, but it is desirable to define a general range: specifically, the terms "umpteen", "umpty", and "zillion". These are derived etymologically from the range affixes:

The prefix "ump-" is added to the first two suffixes to produce the empty numbers "umpteen" and "umpty": it is of uncertain origin. There is a noticeable absence of an empty number in the hundreds range.

Usage of empty numbers:

See also Placeholder name.

See also

References

  1. Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged, 1993, Merriam-Webster
  2. "Large Numbers at MROB".
  3. "Home - Yahoo Answers".
  4. "Hat trick, n.". Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 26 December 2014.
  5. "Shock, n.2". Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 26 December 2014.
  6. "the definition of ton".
  7. "How Do You Say 2010?".
  8. "What is a partitive numeral?".
  9. Gary Blake and Robert W. Bly, The Elements of Technical Writing, pg. 22. New York: Macmillan Publishers, 1993. ISBN 0020130856
Look up Appendix:English ordinal numbers in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Look up Appendix:English numerals in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
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