Numbers in English

In English, we have several different categories of numbers.

The main category is Cardinal numbers. Cardinal numbers are the “regular” ones: one, two, three, four, etc.

I’d like to order fifteen pizzas, please.

Rome fell about 1600 years ago.

My phone number is 555-8593.

The Cardinal numbers can be used in the negative. This can be seen when reading about weather or financing, for example.

It’s minus ten degrees outside!

That cat is so stupid, I think his I.Q. is -4.

Caty’s bank balance is somewhere around -$100.

The next category of numbers is the Ordinal numbers. We use these to show the order of something, such as with dates. They are based on the Cardinal numbers but have different endings.

The woman was in her ninth month of pregnancy and was feeling uncomfortably large.

Sasha came in third in the race.

He was born on May 5th.

Just as we can have negative numbers, we can also have parts of numbers; these are the fractions and decimals.

I only had half a cup of tea this morning.

The television screen took up two-thirds of the wall.

The average North American family is said to have 2.3 children.

The business’ annual income only increased by 0.7% last year.