Writing Large Numbers  

Spanish Grammar Spanish Numbers Writing Large Numbers
100 to 200

Spanish Numbers - 100 to 200

You are already aware that the Spanish for one hundred is cien or ciento.

So, when do you use cien and when should you use ciento?

When there is exactly one hundred of something and the number is used with the noun, you use the shortened form cien, whether that noun is masculine or feminine. For example:

cien libros - one hundred books

cien plumas - one hundred pens

When you want to form numbers with 100, you would use ciento. For example:

101 - ciento uno (100/ciento + 1/uno = ciento uno)

114 - ciento catorce (100/ciento + 14/catorce = ciento catorce)

127 - ciento veintisiete (ciento + veintisiete = ciento veintisiete)

165 - ciento sesenta y cinco (ciento + sesenta y cinco = ciento sesenta y cinco)

Observe that "y" is NOT used to separate hundreds from tens and only used in numbers 131-199 (also 231-299, 331-399, etc).

In other words:

103 - ciento tres NOT ciento y tres

199 - ciento noventa y nueve NOT ciento y noventa y nueve

Century

The word century is translated as siglo. When writing a century, Roman numerals are used after the word siglo, but cardinal numbers are used in speech:

Pronto entramos en el siglo XXI (el siglo veintiuno).
We'll soon enter the 21st Century.

Cervantes nació a mediados del siglo XVI (el siglo dieciséis).
Cervantes was born in the middle of the 16th Century.


200 to 900
Over 1000
Millions
 






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