Numbers and figures

Generally speaking, we follow the guidelines laid out in the Canadian Press Stylebook. It's a great resource, but it costs $37, and we know you'd rather spend your money on tacos.

Here's (most of) what you need to know:

General

• Spell out numbers under 10, and use digits for 10 and above.

  • Three cats, nine trees, 10 friends, 20,000 sales

  • First place, second-best, 11th grade, 60th birthday

• For numbers beginning a sentence, spell out the number.

  • Fifteen people attended the event.

  • Except in blog titles like the following, where we default to digits for ease of reading and scan-ability:

    • 10 Shopify apps to help you win Black Friday

• Spell out fractions.

  • Two-thirds, not 2/3

• Use a hyphen to express a range.

  • International shipping generally takes 10-15 days.

• Numbers in the millions or higher should be written as a combination of words and figures.

  • $23 million, 3.1 million people, etc.

  • When such compound numbers are used as adjectives, add hyphens between the components.

    • a 1.2-million increase in sales

Dates and time

• When referencing dates, use the full, four-digit year. It's also okay to use the abbreviated form for decades.

  • She opened her boutique in 1996.

  • Their site design is stuck in the '90s.

• Specific dates take this format:

  • Thursday, January 11, 2018

• If you're writing the recent date into a sentence, write it like this:

  • We launched the new site October 9th.

• Don't use the possessive form for decades or centuries.

  • 1920s not 1920’s

• Use figures and a.m./p.m. when writing about time. Add a space before a.m./p.m.

  • 7:30 a.m.

  • For "round" times, you can also drop the minutes and write 4 p.m.

    • Just don't write "at 4 p.m. in the afternoon." 🤦‍♀️

Money

• Use the dollar sign before the amount. Include a decimal and number of cents unless it's a round dollar amount.

  • $20 or $19.99

• If the amount is greater than $1 million, write "$1 million," otherwise write it out.

  • $575,000

• Don't use K, M, or B to signify thousand, million, or billion.

  • $100,000 not $100K

Percentages

• Use the percent sign (%) rather than spelling out "percent" (or "per cent").

  • The landing page had a 40% conversion rate.

Other stuff

• Spell out figures of speech not intended to be taken literally.

  • A picture is worth a thousand words, not 1,000

• For numbers in official names, follow the organization’s spelling style even when it is at odds with any of these rules.

  • 4chan, 7 Up, Six Flags ($10 to anyone who can write an article referencing all three of those organizations.)