Numbers

When to write Arabic numerals and when to write numbers as words drives me crazy, especially in dialog.

For example, all dialog:

"It cost me 54 rubles." or "It cost me fifty-four rubles."
"I was born in the year 325." or "I was born in the year three-hundred-twentiy-five."
"You owe me $20.35." or "You owe me twenty dollars and thirty-five cents."
"You owe me 10 million dollars." or "You owe me ten million dollars."

More examples, not dialog:

29 people waited in the room. or... Twenty-nine people waited in the room.
The number 5 appeared on the computer screen. or... The number five appeared on the computer screen.
210 miles to go. or... Two-hundred and ten miles to go.


I've never seen a consistent rule for numbers that seems to make sense in all situations. Basically, I try to use logic. If something makes more sense written as Arabic numerals, I write them as Arabic numerals. If it seems to make more sense written-out, I write them out. In general, one to nine, ten, twenty, thirty, a hundred, two-hundred, three-hundred, a thousand -- I try to write out. I also try to write out numbers in dialog, but it doesn't always seem feasible to, for example when dealing with large sums of money. Also, I heard you should never begin a sentence with an Arabic numeral, but sometimes this can be tough.

Ferret said:

I've seen three different rules for this.
1. Write out numbers one through ten.
2. Write out numbers one through one hundred.
3. Write out numbers that consist of two words (two hundred, three million, but 101).

Pick whichever rule you like and stick to it. If an editor wants to change it later, that's fine. It sounds like you prefer rule three, which is also the one I prefer. Who wants to write 1,000,000,000 when you could write one billion?

Whichever rule you use, don't mix formats when describing one type of thing. For example, mentioning nine people and then 11 people would be wrong. Also, if you must start a sentence with a number, write it out.

Click to expand...

I like what you mentioned about not mixing formats, and I do indeed like rule 3. Any special considerations for dialog?