English numerals

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

Contents

 1 Cardinal numbers
 2 Specialized numbers
 3 Multiplicative adverbs
 4 Negative numbers
 5 Ordinal numbers
 6 Dates
 7 Fractions and decimals
 8 Whether to use digits or words
 9 Empty numbers
 10 See also
 11 References

 12 External links

Cardinal numbers

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

0 zero (nought) 10 ten    

1 one 11 eleven    
2 two 12 twelve 20 twenty
3 three 13 thirteen 30 thirty
4 four 14 fourteen 40 forty (no "u")
5 five 15 fifteen (note "f", not "v") 50 fifty (note "f", not "v")
6 six 16 sixteen 60 sixty
7 seven 17 seventeen 70 seventy
8 eight 18 eighteen (only one "t") 80 eighty (only one "t")
9 nine 19 nineteen 90 ninety (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.

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

In English, the hundreds are perfectly regular, except that the word hundred remains in
its singular form regardless of the number preceding it (nevertheless, one may on the
other hand say "hundreds of people flew in", or the like)

100 one hundred

200 two hundred
… …
900 nine hundred

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

1,000 one thousand

2,000 two thousand
… …
10,000 ten thousand
11,000 eleven thousand
… …
20,000 twenty thousand
21,000 twenty-one thousand
30,000 thirty thousand
85,000 eighty-five thousand
100,000 one hundred thousand or one lakh (Indian English)
nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand (British English)
999,000
nine hundred ninety-nine thousand (American English)
1,000,000 one million
10,000,000 ten 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". 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 Common American Common British

vernacular vernacular vernacular
"How many marbles do "What is your house "Which bus goes to the high
you have?" number?" street?"
"One-oh-one."
101 "A hundred and one." Here, "oh" is used for the "One-oh-one."
digit zero.
109 "A hundred and nine." "One-oh-nine." "One-oh-nine."
110 "A hundred and ten." "One-ten." "One-one-oh."
"A hundred and
117 "One-seventeen." "One-one-seven."
seventeen."
"One-two-oh", "One-two-
120 "A hundred and twenty." "One-twenty."
zero."
152 "A hundred and fifty-two." "One-fifty-two." "One-five-two."
208 "Two hundred and eight." "Two-oh-eight." "Two-oh-eight."
"Three hundred and thirty-
334 "Three-thirty-four." "Three-three-four."
four."

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

Note that 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". For
details, see American and British English differences.

For numbers above a million, there are two different 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):

 the long scale (decreasingly used in British English) designates a system of

numeric names in which a thousand million is called a ‘‘milliard’’ (but the latter
usage is now rare), and ‘‘billion’’ is used for a million million.
 the short scale (always used in American English and increasingly in British
English) designates a system of numeric names in which a thousand million is
called a ‘‘billion’’, and the word ‘‘milliard’’ is not used.

Power
Number notation Short scale Long scale Indian English
notation
1,000,000 106 one million one million ten lakh
1,000,000,000 10 9
one billion one milliard one hundred
 a thousand a thousand crore
million million (one arab)
one trillion one billion
one lakh crore
1,000,000,000,000 1012 a thousand a million
(ten kharab)
billion million
one quadrillion one billiard
ten crore crore
1,000,000,000,000,000 1015 a thousand a thousand
(one padma)
trillion billion
one quintillion one trillion ten thousand
1,000,000,000,000,000,000 1018 a thousand a million crore crore
quadrillion billion (ten shankh)
one sextillion one trilliard
one crore crore
1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 1021 a thousand a thousand
crore
quintillion trillion

The numbers past a trillion, in ascending powers of ten, are as follows: quadrillion,
quintillion, sextillion, septillion, octillion, nonillion, decillion, undecillion, duodecillion,
tredecillion, quattuordecillion, and quindecillion (that's 10 to the 48th, or a one followed
by 48 zeros). The highest number listed on Robert Munafo's table,[1] is a milli-millillion.
That's 10 to the 3000003rd.

The googolplex has often been nominated as the largest named number in the world. If a
googol is ten to the one hundredth, then a googolplex is one followed by a googol of
zeroes.[2]

Although British English has traditionally followed the long-scale numbering system,
the short-scale usage has become increasingly common in recent years. For example,
the UK Government and BBC websites use the newer short-scale values exclusively.

Here are some approximate composite large numbers in American English:

Quantity Written Pronounced

1,200,000 1.2 million one point two million
3,000,000 3 million three million
250,000,000 250 million two hundred fifty million
6,400,000,000 6.4 billion six point four billion
23,380,000,000 23.38 billion twenty-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 commas—to 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

See also: Number_prefix#Table_of_number_prefixes_in_English

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

 0: has several other names, depending on context:

o zero: formal scientific usage
o naught / nought: mostly British usage
o aught: Mostly archaic but still occasionally used when a digit in mid-
number is 0 (as in "thirty-aught-six", the .30-06 Springfield rifle
cartridge and by association guns that fire it)
o oh: used when spelling numbers (like telephone, bank account, bus line
[British: bus route])
o nil: in general sport scores, British usage ("The score is two–nil.")
o nothing: in general sport scores, American usage ("The score is two to
nothing.")
o null: used technically to refer to an object or idea related to nothingness.
The 0th aleph number ( ) is pronounced "aleph-null".
o love: in tennis, badminton, squash and similar sports (origin disputed,
often said to come from French l'œuf, "egg"; but the Oxford English
Dictionary mentions the phrase for love, meaning nothing is at risk)
o zilch, nada (from Spanish), zip: used informally when stressing
nothingness; this is true especially in combination with one another
("You know nothing—zero, zip, nada, zilch!"); American usage
o nix: also used as a verb; mostly American usage
o cypher / cipher: archaic, from French chiffre, in turn from Arabic sifr,
meaning zero
o goose egg (informal)

 1:
o ace: in certain sports and games, as in tennis or golf, indicating success
with one stroke, and the face of a die or playing card with one pip
o birdie in golf denotes one stroke less than par, and bogey, one stroke
more than par
o solo
o unit
o linear the degree of a polynomial is 1

 2:
o couple
o brace, from Old French "arms" (the plural of arm), as in "what can be
held in two arms".
o pair
o deuce: the face of a die or playing card with two pips
o eagle in golf denotes two strokes less than par
o duo
o quadratic the degree of a polynomial is 2
 3:
o trey: the face of a die or playing card with three pips
o trio
o trips: three-of-a-kind in a poker hand. a player has three cards with the
same numerical value
 o cubic the degree of a polynomial is 3
o albatross in golf denotes three strokes less than par. Sometimes called
double eagle
 4:
o cater: (rare) the face of a die or playing card with four pips
o quartet
o quartic or biquadratic the degree of a polynomial is 4
o condor in golf denotes four strokes less than par
 5:
o cinque: (rare) the face of a die or playing card with five pips
o quintet
o nickel (informal American, from the value of the nickel (United States
coin), but applied in non-monetary references)
o quintic the degree of a polynomial is 5
 6:
o half a dozen
o sice: (rare) the face of a die or playing card with six pips
o sextet
o sextic or hectic the degree of a polynomial is 6
 7:
o septet
o septic or heptic the degree of a polynomial is 7
 8:
o octet
 9:
o nonet
 10:
o decet
 12: a dozen (first power of the duodecimal base), used mostly in commerce
 13: a baker's dozen
 20: a score (first power of the vigesimal base), nowadays archaic; famously used
in the opening of the Gettysburg Address: "Four score and seven years ago..."
The Number of the Beast in the King James Bible is rendered "Six hundred
threescore and six".
 50: half a century, literally half of a hundred, usually used in cricket scores.
 100: a century, also used in cricket scores.
 120: a great hundred (twelve tens; as opposed to the small hundred, i.e. 100 or
ten tens), also called small gross (ten dozens), both archaic; also sometimes
referred to as duodecimal hundred
 144: a gross (a dozen dozens, second power of the duodecimal base), used
mostly in commerce
 1000: a grand, colloquially used especially when referring to money, also in
fractions and multiples, e.g. half a grand, two grand, etc.
 1728: a great gross (a dozen gross, third power of the duodecimal base), used
mostly in commerce
 10,000: a myriad (a hundred hundred), commonly used in the sense of an
indefinite very high number
 100,000: a lakh (a hundred thousand), loanword used mainly in Indian English
 10,000,000: a crore (a hundred lakh), loanword used mainly in Indian English
  10100: googol (1 followed by 100 zeros), used in mathematics; not to be confused
with the name of the company Google (which was originally a misspelling of
googol)
 10googol googolplex (1 followed by a googol of zeros)
 10googolplex googolplexplex (1 followed by a googolplex of zeros)

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

 1–0    British English: one nil; American English: one-nothing, one-zip, or one-
zero
 0–0    British English: nil-nil, or more rarely nil all; American English: zero-zero
or nothing-nothing, (occasionally scoreless or no score)
 2–2    two-two or two all; American English also twos, two to two, even at two,
or two up.)

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

Multiplicative adverbs

A few numbers have specialised multiplicative numbers expresses how many times
something happens:

one time once

two times twice
three times thrice

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, Americans colloquially say
"below" —short for "below zero"— so a temperature of -5 ° is "five below".

Ordinal numbers

See also: Numbering of storeys in buildings

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

0th zeroth or noughth (see below) 10th tenth    

1st first 11th eleventh    
2nd second 12th twelfth (note "f", not "v") 20th twentieth
3rd third 13th thirteenth 30th thirtieth
4th fourth 14th fourteenth 40th fortieth
5th fifth 15th fifteenth 50th fiftieth
6th sixth 16th sixteenth 60th sixtieth
7th seventh 17th seventeenth 70th seventieth
8th eighth (only one "t") 18th eighteenth 80th eightieth
9th ninth (no "e") 19th nineteenth 90th ninetieth
Zeroth only has a meaning when counts start 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.

21st twenty-first
25th twenty-fifth
32nd thirty-second
58th fifty-eighth
64th sixty-fourth
79th seventy-ninth
83rd eighty-third
99th ninety-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.

 The suffixes -th, -st, -nd and -rd are occasionally written superscript above the
number itself.
 If the tens digit of a number is 1, then write "th" after the number. For example:
13th, 19th, 112th, 9,311th.
 If the tens digit is not equal to 1, then use the following table:

If the units digit is: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

write this after the number th st nd rd th th th th th th
 For example: 2nd, 7th, 20th, 23rd, 52nd, 135th, 301st.

These ordinal abbreviations are actually hybrid contractions of a numeral and a word.
1st is "1" + "st" from "first". Similarly, we use "nd" 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".

 For example: 42d, 33d, 23d

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.

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

Dates

See also: Calendar date

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

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 fractions (partitive numerals[3]):

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 (not common in British English); 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:
o 0.002 is "two thousandths" (mainly U.S.); or "point zero zero two",
"point oh oh two", "nought point zero zero two", etc.
o 3.1416 is "three point one four one six"
o 99.3 is "ninety-nine and three tenths" (mainly U.S.); or "ninety-nine
point three".
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:

o 1 1/2 is "one and a half"
o 6 1/4 is "six and a quarter"
o 7 5/8 is "seven and five eighths"

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.


o 9 1/2
o 9½

Whether to use digits or words

According to most copy editors and English teachers,[citation needed] the numbers zero to
nine inclusive should be "written out" – meaning instead of "1" and "2", one would
write "one" and "two".

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 twenty-five oranges."
"That is 125 oranges." (Preferred)

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

The above rules are not always used. 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

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:

 "-teen" (designating the range as being between 10 and 20)

 "-ty" (designating the range as being in one of the decades between 20 and 100)
 "-illion" (designating the range as being above 1,000,000; or, more generally, as
being extremely large).

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:

 The word "umpteen" may be used as an adjective, as in "I had to go to umpteen

stores to find shoes that fit." It can also be used to modify a larger number,
usually "million", as in "Umpteen million people watched the show; but they
still cancelled it."
 "Umpty" is not in common usage. It can appear in the form "umpty-one"
(parallelling the usage in such numbers as "twenty-one"), as in "There are
umpty-one ways to do it wrong." "Umpty-ump" is also heard, though "ump" is
never used by itself.
 The word "zillion" may be used as an adjective, modifying a noun. The noun
phrase normally contains the indefinite article "a", as in "There must be a zillion
sites on the World Wide Web."
 The plural "zillions" designates a number indefinitely larger than "millions" or
"billions". In this case, the construction is parallel to the one for "millions" or
"billions", with the number used as a plural count noun, followed by a
prepositional phrase with "of", as in "Out in the countryside, the night sky is
filled with zillions of stars."
 Empty numbers are sometimes made up, with obvious meaning: "squillions" is
obviously an empty, but very large, number; a "squintillionth" would be a very
small number.
 Some empty numbers may be modified by actual numbers, such as "four
zillion", and are used for jest, exaggeration, or to relate abstractly to actual
numbers.
 Empty numbers are colloquial, and primarily used in oral speech or informal
contexts. They are inappropriate in formal or scholarly usage.

See also Placeholder name.

See also

Mathematics portal
 Indefinite and fictitious numbers
  List of numbers
 Long and short scales
 Names of large numbers
 Number prefixes and their derivatives
 Natural number

References

1. ^ MROB
2. ^ Yahoo!
3. ^ What is a partitive numeral?

External links

 English Numbers - explanations, exercises and number generator (cardinal and

ordinal numbers)
 Write out numbers - automatic numbers (and sum of money) translation to
English and Russian language