Spanish numbers

A combination of numbers in a dice roll

Would you like to acquire how to write and read any Spanish number that comes to your mind? You've come to the right place!

Spanish numbers are easy to larn. In this commodity, you'll find a step-by-step explanation and some useful tools, like our Spanish number translator (right below!)

Castilian numbers: translator

Every Castilian numeral

First, let's have a bird's-eye view. These are all the numerals yous'll ever need to learn by heart. Any other number is written every bit a combination of them:

Spanish number chart

The rules: 1-g

Primary numbers in Spanish: units and tens

Commencement of all, here are the Spanish numbers from 0 to 9:

0 cero
i uno
2 dos
3 tres
4 cuatro
v cinco
6 seis
vii siete
8 ocho
9 nueve

Make sure you lot memorized them all (you'll find some mnemonic aids below).

Now, allow'south see the tens, from 10 to ninety:

x diez
twenty veinte
30 treinta
40 cuarenta
l cincuenta
60 sesenta
70 setenta
80 ochenta
90 noventa

At present, you lot've learned a full of xix Castilian numbers, right? Wrong! Actually, you know 82, considering numbers from 31 all the way to 99 are formed simply past writing the tens and the units, separated by the word y (and).

Hither's how:

31 treinta y uno
32 treinta y dos
33 treinta y tres
… …
97 noventa y siete
98 noventa y ocho
99 noventa y nueve

"Special" numbers: 1-30

Just, what near the numbers from xi to 29? There are specific numerals for them, and so you'll need to larn them by middle. Don't worry though, you'll find some patterns that will get in easier.

11 once 21 veintiuno
12 doce 22 veintidós
13 trece 23 veintitrés
14 catorce 24 veinticuatro
fifteen quince 25 veinticinco
sixteen dieciséis 26 veintiséis
17 diecisiete 27 veintisiete
18 dieciocho 28 veintiocho
nineteen diecinueve 29 veintinueve

Counting from 100 to chiliad

Congratulations! Now you know how to count from 0 to 99. To be able to count all the style to 1000, you lot just demand to larn ten more Castilian numbers, the hundreds:

100 cien / ciento
200 doscientos
300 trescientos
400 cuatrocientos
500 quinientos
600 seiscientos
700 setecientos
800 ochocientos
900 novecientos

To form the balance of the numbers, just write first the give-and-take for the hundreds, and so the "remaining" number, from one to 99, only as earlier.

But what is "one hundred" in Spanish? "Ane hundred" is ciento well-nigh always. Information technology is cien merely when the number is exactly 100, or when it goes right before mil (thousand), millones (millions), millardos (billions), billones (trillions), then on (more on that later).

100 cien
101 ciento uno
102 ciento dos
… …
199 ciento noventa y nueve

Large numbers

To be able to count all the fashion to millions, you just need to learn a couple of new words:

chiliad mil
1 000 000 millón

The thousands to a higher place thou are written exactly the same as in English language: two thousand (dos mil), and so forth.

1000 mil
2000 dos mil
222 000 doscientos veintidós mil

If the number is not an exact multiple of 1000, then just add the rest at the end, only every bit in English language:

i225 mil doscientos veinticinco
999888 novecientos noventa y nueve mil ochocientos ochenta y ocho

Millions

For millions, you do also just as in English language: start, you write the number of millions and then the residual of the number. The merely difference is that when the number of millions is greater than one, the plural form is used (millones instead of millón).

1 000 000 un millón
2 000 000 dos millones
100 000 100 cien millones cien

Gazillions!

Unlike in English language, in Spanish we utilise the long scale of powers of a million. That means that un billón is non "grand millions", merely "one million millions". By the aforementioned token, un trillón is "ane 1000000 of billones", and so on:

one 000 000 (x6) un millón
ane 000 000 000 (109) mil millones (or un millardo)
1 000 000 000 000 (1012) un billón
1018 united nations trillón
1024 united nations cuatrillón
1030 un quintillón
1036 united nations sextillón
x42 un septillón
1048 un octillón
ten54 united nations nonillón
1060 un decillón
ten66 un undecillón
1072 un duodecillón
ten78 un tredecillón
1084 un cuatordecillón
1090 un quindecillón
1096 un sexdecillón
10102 un septendecillón
10108 united nations octodecillón
10114 un novendecillón
10120 un vigintillón
gazillions tropecientos / chorrocientos millones

In Castilian-speaking countries, a common error is to interpret the give-and-take billion equally billón. This is a serious (if understandable) error since the resulting number is 999 000 000 000 units greater than the original.

On the other manus, this "mistake" is then common among Spanish speakers living in the U.s. that finally, in 2014, the Royal Spanish Academy added, in the 23rd edition of its lexicon, a second entry for the word billón in the Usa, meaning precisely billion. Thus, for a Spanish speaker living in the USA, the apply of the short scale is now considered acceptable.

The word «millón» is a noun

In sentences such equally ane meg euros, yous must employ the discussion de (millón de, millones de). That's considering, strictly speaking, the word millón is not a numeral, but a noun. Thus, it is used in the same manner as whatever other quantity noun:

  • Un millón de dólares. — One million dollars.
  • United nations montón de monedas. — A pile of coins.
  • Dos litros de agua. — Two liters of water.

The same happens with the words millardo, billón, trillón, so on.

Mnemonics

The Spanish numbers tin can be more easily remembered if you associate them with English words that have a common origin (or some kind of resemblance).

uno union, unit, unique
dos duo, duet, dual
tres triple, trilogy, trident
cuatro quadruped, quadriceps, quad bicycle
cinco zinc, "Thing co.", lingo, bingo
seis space, confront, lace
siete September (the seventh month on the Roman calendar)
ocho October, octopus, octogenarian
nueve November
diez December, decimal
once "one time and for all"
doce dozen
cien(to) century, cent, centimeter

Apocope and gender

The Spanish numbers uno and veintiuno are apocopated (shortened) when they are right before a noun, adjective or another numeral. Then they go united nations y veintiún, respectively:

One Uno
One domestic dog Un perro
1 cute dog Un bello perro
20-one Veintiuno
Twenty-1 dollars Veintiún dólares
Twenty-grand Veintiún mil
Thirty-one Treinta y uno
Thirty-1 dollars Treinta y united nations dólares

Some numerals take specifically feminine forms. These are needed when the number precedes a feminine word:

Masculine Feminine
uno, un una
veintiuno, veintiún veintiuna
doscientos, trescientos, …, novecientos doscientas, trescientas, …, novecientas

On the other paw, the feminine forms are never apocopated.

1 ball Una pelota
20-one pounds Veintiuna libras
Xxx-one 1000 pounds Treinta y una mil libras

In the last case (numerals ending in -one before mil), the feminine form is considered optional. That is, information technology is also correct (and frequent) to say treinta y un mil libras.

As millardo(s), millón(es), billón(es), etc., are all masculine nouns, numerals earlier them are always masculine: 21,000,000 pounds → veintiún millones de libras.

At this bespeak, you should be able to do well on whatever of our quizzes on Spanish numbers. Go ahead, I'll wait for yous.

Castilian numbers with a decimal part

Periods, commas, apostrophes… Traditionally, several unlike delimiters accept been used to split the partial part from the integer office of a decimal number. Currently, the recommended separator in Spanish is the comma, as established by international guidelines (the period is also acceptable, though).

For example, the number pi in Spanish is 3,14159… In words: tres coma uno cuatro uno cinco nueve…

The separator for the thousands was traditionally the menstruum, but in the currently recommended format, it'southward a white space (which can be a thin space). This manner, nosotros avoid possible defoliation with the decimal signal. Numbers with only four digits must not be separated.

English language Castilian
8,212 8212
2,000,000 two 000 000
57,235.12 57 235,12

Real examples of sentences with Spanish numbers

Los jueces le dieron cero (0) puntos.
No se puede conducir con más de 0,5 (cero coma cinco) gramos de booze por litro de sangre.
Marta tenía entonces veintiún años (21), Javier treinta y uno (31).
250 (doscientas cincuenta) personas se beneficiarán por el tope de 25,64 euros (veinticinco euros con sesenta y cuatro céntimos).
En 2016 (dos mil dieciséis), más de 472 (cuatrocientos setenta y dos) millones de personas tienen el español como lengua materna.

Some things you lot may have noticed:

  • In Castilian, any quantity which is non exactly "1", including "0", is expressed in plural form. Even when the number is "1.0", or "1.00", the plural form is also used, equally in 1,0 gramos .
  • In some cases, it is correct to mix digits and letters to express a number, similar in 400 millones (400 000 000) or 2,five billones (ii 500 000 000 000).
  • When writing dates in Castilian, days of the calendar month and years are typically written with numbers (e.g. sixteen de febrero de 2016, although Roman numerals can also be used sometimes).

Some idioms using primal numbers

  • ¡Eres el/la número uno! — "Y'all're the number one!" (the best).
  • Una de dos, o pagas, o vas a la cárcel. — "1 of two things is true: either you pay or yous get to prison".
  • ¡No consigo dormirme ni a la de tres! — "I can't autumn asleep, no matter how hard I effort!"
  • Al funeral fueron cuatro gatos. — "Hardly a soul attended the funeral".
  • ¡Choca esos cinco! — "Let'southward shake on it!"
  • Se quedó allí más chulo que un ocho. — "He stood there prouder than a peacock" (arrogant, prove-off).
  • Se mantuvo en sus trece todo el rato. — "He stuck to his guns all the time".
  • ¡Le voy a cantar las cuarenta! — "I'll tell him a few abode truths!"
  • Ese tipo de cosas me ponen a cien. — "This sort of thing drives me up the wall" (make sb. aroused, or very excited).
  • Ayer estuvo allí el ciento y la madre.. — "The earth and its wife was in that location yesterday".
  • Esa es la pregunta del millón. — "That'south the million-dollar question".

References

If you lot tin can read Castilian, in these articles y'all'll find more in-depth information about the Castilian numbers:

  • The Full general commodity by the RAE 'south Diccionario Panhispánico de Dudas about números (numbers).
  • Specific commodity of the DPD about cardinales (cardinal numbers).
  • Very in-depth article nearly La Numeración (PDF, 172 KB), by the Spanish linguist and writer José Martínez de Sousa. Somewhat outdated, compared to the DPD, but still useful.