How do Spanish ordinals show gender?

Most Spanish ordinals end in -o for masculine and -a for feminine: primero and primera, segundo and segunda. The ending agrees with the noun it modifies, so el primer día is masculine and la primera vez is feminine.

What is the apocope of primero and tercero?

Before a masculine singular noun, primero shortens to primer and tercero shortens to tercer, as in el primer piso and el tercer acto. This apocope happens only in the masculine. Select the apocope option to get those forms.

How is the abbreviation written?

Spanish abbreviates ordinals with the number plus a period and a superscript º for masculine or ª for feminine, for example 1.º and 2.ª. The degree sign is not used; the correct character is the masculine ordinal indicator º or feminine ª.

The tool builds compound ordinals through the hundreds and beyond, such as vigésimo primero (21st) and centésimo (100th). Above the low thousands, native speakers usually switch to the cardinal form, but the tool still constructs the ordinal where one exists.

Spanish Ordinal Words

Email me this result

Get this tool's output sent to your inbox, plus one useful tool a week. No spam, unsubscribe any time.

Build Spanish ordinals correctly

Spanish ordinals (primero, segundo, tercero …) agree in gender with their noun and have a few irregular forms that trip up writers — especially the apocope, where primero and tercero drop their final o before a masculine noun to become primer and tercer. This tool generates the full ordinal word for any position, in the gender you choose, and shows the correct abbreviated form like 1.º or 2.ª.

How it works

The tool stores the base ordinal stems for units, tens, hundreds, and thousands (primer-, vigésim-, centésim-, milésim-), then assembles a compound by naming the hundreds, tens, and units pieces and joining them with spaces, as Spanish does (vigésimo primero for 21st). It applies the gender ending — -o for masculine, -a for feminine — to every piece. When you select the apocope option, primero and tercero become primer and tercer. The abbreviation is built from the digits plus a period and the º or ª indicator.

Tips and example

Enter 1 and pick masculine to get primero (abbreviation 1.º); switch to feminine for primera (1.ª); choose apocope for primer. Position 21 gives vigésimo primero, and 100 gives centésimo. Remember that Spanish writes the ordinal indicator with a real º or ª character and a period before it (3.º), not a degree symbol. For dates and centuries above tenth, Spanish often prefers the cardinal (siglo veintiuno, not vigésimo primero), so use judgement for very large positions.