Expressing Dates In Spanish - Grammar

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Expressing dates in SpanishWritten by qualified Spanish expert Silvia Piriz BALast updated: 2026-02-059 questionsTake the fastest path to fluent SpanishJoin now for free!

Dates in Spanish are expressed in a different way to English.

Learn about dates in Spanish

Read and listen to these examples:

7 de febrero de 1986.7th February 1986 / February 7 1986

15 de julio de 1949.15th July 1949 / July 15 1949

23 de diciembre de 200123rd December 2001/ December 23 2001

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

number + de + month + de + year Don't forget de! In Spanish it is compulsory.

Article El

When the date is in a sentence that is telling you when something takes place you need the article "el" before the number.

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

Mi cumpleaños es el 14 de mayo.My birthday is the 14th of May/ May 14.

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.

Uno de octubre / Primero de octubre1st of October / October 1

Month

In Spanish, months are never capitalised:

enero	mayo	septiembre
febrero	junio	octubre
marzo	julio	noviembre
abril	agosto	diciembre

Year

In Spanish, years are always read as full numbers!

1789 (mil setecientos ochenta y nueve)1789 (seventeen eighty-nine)

2018 (dos mil dieciocho)2018 (twenty eighteen)

1920 (mil novecientos veinte)1920 (nineteen twenty)

1972 (mil novecientos setenta y dos)1972 (nineteen seventy-two)

You never say: diecinueve sesenta y cuatro (1964) but mil novecientos sesenta y cuatro. Have a look at List of numbers from 1 to 50 in Spanish

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Learn more about these related Spanish grammar topics

• Artículo definido
• Nombre

Examples and resources

1920 (mil novecientos veinte)1920 (nineteen twenty)1972 (mil novecientos setenta y dos)1972 (nineteen seventy-two)1789 (mil setecientos ochenta y nueve)1789 (seventeen eighty-nine)Mi cumpleaños es el 14 de mayo.My birthday is the 14th of May/ May 14.23 de diciembre de 200123rd December 2001/ December 23 20012018 (dos mil dieciocho)2018 (twenty eighteen)Uno de octubre / Primero de octubre1st of October / October 115 de julio de 1949.15th July 1949 / July 15 19497 de febrero de 1986.7th February 1986 / February 7 1986 Getting that for you now...