Expressing dates in Spanish

Posted by Silvia Piriz

In: Level A0, Numbers, Time & Date, Artículo definido, Nombre

Questions: 3

Read and listen to these examples:

To say the date in Spanish, you need to use this structure:

Article El

Don't forget the definite article el before the date.

Note that dates are always masculine, so it's never la.

Number

The main difference between dates in English and Spanish is the numbers:

• English dates use ordinal numbers (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th...)
• Spanish dates use cardinal numbers (dos, tres, cuatro, etc.) so, not segundo (2nd), tercero (3rd), cuarto (4th), etc.
• EXCEPTION For the first day of the month, you can use both cardinal (uno) and ordinal (primero) numbers. Both are correct.

Month

In Spanish, months are never capitalised:

Year

In Spanish, years are always read as full numbers!

Q&A

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Carole

Kwiziq community member

23 July 2018

2 replies

El 15 de julio de 19 49. In writing is the year eg 1949 always expressed in figures or can it be words?

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Inma

Kwiziq language super star

23 July 2018

23/07/18

Hi Carole

In Spanish, like in English, the year is generally written in numbers (1956, 2009, ...) but when you say it you need to literally say it as if it was a number, unlike in English which is expressed in "pairs".

So, in Spanish:

1975 ="mil / novecientos / setenta y cinco".

But in English:

1975 = "nineteen / seventy five"

Regards

Inma

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Carole

Kwiziq community member

30 July 2018

30/07/18

Thank you, a perfect answer for me.

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