Numbers in Spanish - Spanish411 (2024)

Let's start with the good news: there is (almost) no difference between the way that we write numbers in Spanish and the way we write them in English. The bad news is that when we use numbers in conversation, they definitely aren't pronounced the same way. But whether you've picked it up from "Sesame Street" or "Dora the Explorer" you probably already know at least a handful of Spanish numbers. Keep reading to learn more.

Cardinal Numbers

A "cardinal number" is just a fancy term for a numbers we use in counting things (or indicating times, dates, or ages). Let's take a trip through the Spanish cardinal numbers from cero (0) to un trilión (1,000,000,000,000,000,000) noticing some interesting quirks along the way.

Fun Fact: Cinco is the only Spanish number with the same number of letters as the number it represents.

The first 10 numbers (as well as zero) all have unique names:

The next five also have unique names:

Note: There are two acceptable options for writing the numbers 16 through 19. The "old-school" way is to simply say "ten and six," "ten and seven," etc. The newer method is to combine those words into one word. At that point the "z" in diez becomes a "c" and the "y" becomes an "i." Both versions are pronounced the same way. The shorter, combined word is preferred nowadays.

After that the numbers come in combinations. You are literally saying "ten and six," "ten and seven," "ten and eight," etc.:

Veinte means "twenty" and from that point on the pattern is very similar to sixteen through nineteen; you are literally saying "twenty and one," "twenty and two," etc.:

Note: Once again it is also preferable to condense these numbers down to one word by replacing the trailing "-e" and the "y" with an "i." Twenty two, twenty three, and twenty six will also need an additional accent mark.

After veinte comes treinta and the same pattern is followed:

Note: After the twenties we no longer condense our numbers into one word.

All of the numbers in the forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties, and nineties work the same way as in the thirties:

Technically ciento means "one hundred" in Spanish, but its shortened form, cien, is preferred when there are exactly 100 of something:

You may notice there is no longer any "y." This is because the "y" is only used to separate the 10's place from the 1's place. If there is nothing in the 10's place, we don't use "y."

Note: The plural of cien is cientos (not cienes.)

Ciento is followed by:

"One thousand" in Spanish is mil. And we don't un mil; it's simply mil:

After the thousands comes the 10s and 100s of thousands:

Note: In compound numbers, use ciento if the number that follows is smaller than 100. Use cien if the number that follows is larger than 100.

Next, a thousand thousand is a million or un millón. When we move from one million, millón becomes millones:

Now things get a little weird. Adding three zeros to a million in English gets us to a billion. But in Spanish it's a mil millón, or a thousand million. This throws the rest of the chart out of synch with what we might expect as well:

Cardinal Numbers as Adjectives

If you're simply counting numbers (like in "Hide and Seek" while your friends are hiding) the list above is accurate. However, much of the time when we use a number we follow it up with a noun, e.g. "six cars," "24 tables," "38 houses," etc. When we do this we're actually using the number as an adjective and some interesting things need to happen.

First of all uno gets shortened to un when it comes before a masculine noun, and likewise numbers ending in "-uno" are shortened to "-ún" (note the accent mark). Ciento is also shortened to cien when (and only when) we're dealing with exactly 100 of something. For example:

Secondly, as with other adjectives, we need to make our numbers agree in gender with the nouns that they modify. However, this only happens with numbers ending in "-uno" and words ending in "-ientos" (all of the "hundreds" words from 200 to 900). For example:

Every part of a number that can agree with the gender of the noun should agree. For example 654,321 tables would be written out as "seiscientas cincuenta y cuatro mil trescientas veintiuna mesas."

Decimal Points and Commas

You may have noticed the strange looking decimal points in the right hand column above. This is not a typo. The majority of Spanish-speaking countries do the opposite of English-speaking countries when it comes to decimal points and grouping thousands: commas are used for decimal points and periods are used to separate the groups of zeros. The number "21.7" would be written "21,7" in Spanish and would be read "veintiuno punto siete."

Ordinal Numbers

While we use cardinal numbers to count things, we use "ordinal numbers" to put things in order (such as the order in which runners finish a race). Here are the Spanish ordinal numbers :

• When used as adjectives, all of the ordinals agree in gender with the noun they modify, therefore "-o" endings change to "-a" with feminine nouns. For example: la segunda casa, su tercera novia, mi última tarea.
• The ordinals primero and tercero are shortened to primer and tercer when used with masculine nouns. For example; en primer lugar, en tercer grado. This is only true of primero and tercero.
• When an ordinal prefix ending in "-imo" is combined with "octavo" one of the o's is dropped to avoid repeating the same sound, e.g. "decimoctavo."
• Ordinals are not typically used with dates; use cardinal numbers instead: "Hoy es el quince de enero."
• We often use a sort of shorthand abbreviation for ordinals in English — 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. We can do something similar in Spanish — 1º, 2º, 3º, etc. (or 1ª, 2ª, 3ª, etc. if feminine)

Fractions

We express Spanish fractions the following way:

From "fourths" to "tenths" we simply use ordinal numbers. From "elevenths" to "twentieths" we use cardinal numbers with the suffix avo. Beyond "twentieths" we simply use an ordinal number with the word parte. E.g.: un trigésimo parte.

Multiples

Note: Multiples can also have masculine and feminine forms: cuádruplo, cuádrupla.

We use "multiplicatives" to make multiples out of a number. Spanish multiples are similar to the English:

Percentages

Precentages are written the same way in Spanish as they are in English. The word "percent" is por ciento in Spanish.

Fun Numbers Facts

• When writing checks in Spanish it is acceptable (and a good idea) to write "un mil" rather than the grammatically correct "mil" to ensure that no one alters the check amount.
• Writing "two or three" in Spanish looks like this, "2 o 3," and could possibly be confused with "203." Because of this the "or" is somtimes accented to avoid confusion: "2 ó 3." (As handwriting is being replaced by technology, the need to do this is diminishing.)