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How To Write Ordinal Numbers
Question
What is the rule when adding "th" or "st" or "nd" or "rd" when typing dates such as "July 4th"?
—
Betty
,
United States
Answer
When writing ordinal numbers such as 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. you should use the last two letters on the word as it would be if you wrote out the whole word. Below are the ordinal numbers both written out and with digits for 1-20.
- first 1st
- second 2nd
- third 3rd
- fourth 4th
- fifth 5th
- sixth 6th
- seventh 7th
- eighth 8th
- ninth 9th
- tenth 10th
- eleventh 11th
- twelfth 12th
- thirteenth 13th
- fourteenth 14th
- fifteenth 15th
- sixteenth 16th
- seventeenth 17th
- eighteenth 18th
- nineteenth 19th
- twentieth 20th
As you can see, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd use -st, -nd, and -rd, but 4th-20th use -th. Follow this pattern for the numbers moving forward:
21st, 31st, 41st, etc. all use -st like 1st.
22nd, 32nd, 42nd, etc. all use -nd like 2nd.
23rd, 33rd, 43rd, etc. all use -rd like 3rd.
All the rest use -th (24th, 37th, 49th, 50th, 68th, 126th…).
I hope this helps.
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