Structure of dates

Dates in Chinese follow the order "year, month, day." This is in keeping with the larger "from big to small" trend in Chinese.

Structure

As with many things in Chinese, dates are arranged from largest unit to smallest: year, month, day.

x 年 y 月 z 日

So April 1st, 2013 is 2013年4月1日.

Note that 号 (hào) is commonly used in spoken Mandarin instead of 日 (rì): 2013年4月1号. In written Chinese, however, you will see 日 rather than 号.

x 年 y 月 z 号

Examples

• 1940 年 11 月 27 日November 27th,1940
• 1973 年 7 月 20 日July 20th, 1973
• 1868 年 1 月 18 号January 18th, 1868
• 1910 年 8 月 9 号August 9th, 1910
• 10 月 1 号 我们 去 上海。On October first we'll go to Shanghai.
• 我 的 爸爸 是 1945 年 7 月 去 美国 的。My dad went to the USA in July, 1945.
• 我 是 1985 年 11 月 17 号 出生 的。I was born November 17, 1985.
• 我 的 生日 是 11 月 17 号。My birthday is the 17th of November.
• 1980 年 9 月 4 号 我们 结婚 了。We got married on September 4th, 1980.
• 1949 年 10 月 1 日，中华人民共和国 成立 了 。On October 1, 1949, the People's Republic of China was established.
• 每 年 的 12 月 24 日 是 我们 的 平安夜。Every year December 24th is our Christmas Eve.

See also

• Structure of numbers
• Structure of days of the week
• Structure of times

Sources and further reading

Books

• Integrated Chinese: Level 1, Part 1 (3rd ed) (pp. 73-4)　→buy
• New Practical Chinese Reader 1 (新实用汉语课本1) (pp. 122-3) →buy
• New Practical Chinese Reader 1 (新实用汉语课本1)(2nd ed) (pp. 141-2) →buy