Writing numbers in Croatian involves a few conventions that look like typos to an English speaker but are in fact load-bearing. The most important is the period after an ordinal number: 1. means "first," 5. means "fifth." That little dot is not decoration — it is a written instruction telling the reader to read the digit as an ordinal, and it changes the grammatical form of everything around it. Get comfortable with the ordinal-period and you have unlocked dates, which are built entirely from it.
This page covers how numbers, dates, time, currency, and everyday abbreviations are written. For how to say numbers and years aloud, see reading numbers, years, and prices aloud.
The ordinal period
Croatian writes ordinal numbers as a digit followed by a period. Where English writes 1st, 2nd, 5th, Croatian writes 1., 2., 5..
| Numeral | Reads as | English |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | prvi | 1st (first) |
| 2. | drugi | 2nd (second) |
| 5. | peti | 5th (fifth) |
| 21. | dvadeset prvi | 21st (twenty-first) |
Živim na 3. katu.
I live on the 3rd floor.
Svibanj je 5. mjesec u godini.
May is the 5th month of the year.
The deep point to grasp is that the period is doing morphological work. 5. is not just "5" — it stands in for peti / petog / petom…, a fully inflecting adjective that must agree in case, gender, and number with its noun. The period is a compression of all those endings. That is why, when you read 5. aloud, you have to "unpack" it into the right form for the sentence.
Sjedi u 7. redu.
He's sitting in the 7th row.
For the full set of ordinal forms and how they decline, see ordinals.
Dates
Croatian dates run day – month – year, each component followed by a period, in either of two styles:
- Spelled-out month:
- lipnja 2026.
- All-numeric:
- 2026.
Sastanak je 17. lipnja 2026.
The meeting is on June 17, 2026.
Rođena je 3. 8. 1995.
She was born on August 3, 1995.
Two things deserve a close look.
First, the period after the year. 2026. keeps its period because the year is itself an ordinal — the two-thousand-twenty-sixth year (godine). The dot is not optional punctuation; it is the same ordinal marker as on the day.
Second — and this is the interlocking grammar point — the month goes into the GENITIVE case when a day is given. The base name of the month is lipanj ("June"), but in a date you write lipnja ("of June"). The day is "the seventeenth of June," so the month sits in the genitive.
Danas je 1. svibnja.
Today is the 1st of May.
Vidimo se 25. prosinca.
See you on December 25th.
Compare the base (dictionary) month name with its date form:
| Month (nominative) | In a date (genitive) | English |
|---|---|---|
| siječanj | siječnja | January |
| lipanj | lipnja | June |
| svibanj | svibnja | May |
| prosinac | prosinca | December |
17. encodes sedamnaesti/sedamnaestog ("seventeenth"), and that ordinal governs the month into the genitive (lipnja). So the date is one tightly geared little machine — the period sets off the morphology that pulls the month into the genitive. For the case itself, see the genitive in time and dates.When you write the month with no day — just naming the month — it stays in the nominative: Lipanj je bio vruć ("June was hot"). The genitive only appears once a day is attached. (Remember from capitalization that month names are always lowercase.)
Time
The 24-hour clock is standard in writing and official contexts. Croatian uses a period or a colon between hours and minutes; both are seen, with the period being traditional.
Vlak polazi u 14.30.
The train leaves at 14:30 (2:30 p.m.).
Sastanak počinje u 9:00 sati.
The meeting starts at 9:00.
The word sat means both "hour" and "o'clock" (and "a watch/clock"). In speech the 12-hour reckoning with ujutro / popodne / navečer is common; in writing, especially schedules, the 24-hour form dominates.
Currency
Since 1 January 2023, Croatia's currency is the euro (symbol €); the former kuna (kn) appears only in older texts and historical references. The amount precedes the unit, and the decimal uses a comma (see punctuation).
Kava košta 1,80 eura.
The coffee costs 1.80 euros.
Platili smo 45 € za večeru.
We paid €45 for dinner.
Prije 2023. cijene su bile u kunama.
Before 2023, prices were in kuna.
Note that eura in the first example is the genitive plural form that the number governs — number-and-noun agreement, covered under numeral government, but the orthography to absorb here is simply: amount, comma-decimal, then the unit.
Common abbreviations
These high-frequency abbreviations appear constantly in real Croatian text. Most end in a period.
| Abbreviation | Full form | English |
|---|---|---|
| npr. | na primjer | e.g. (for example) |
| itd. | i tako dalje | etc. (and so on) |
| tj. | to jest | i.e. (that is) |
| str. | stranica | p. (page) |
| br. | broj | no. (number) |
| g. | gospodin / godina | Mr / year |
| gđa | gospođa | Mrs / Ms |
| tzv. | takozvani | so-called |
Donesi voće, npr. jabuke ili banane.
Bring fruit, e.g. apples or bananas.
Odgovor je na str. 42.
The answer is on p. 42.
Stigao je g. Horvat.
Mr. Horvat has arrived.
Common mistakes
❌ Sastanak je 17. lipanj 2026.
Incorrect — with a day given, the month must be genitive (lipnja).
✅ Sastanak je 17. lipnja 2026.
The meeting is on June 17, 2026.
❌ Živim na 3 katu.
Incorrect — an ordinal needs the period (3.).
✅ Živim na 3. katu.
I live on the 3rd floor.
❌ Rođena je 1995.
Incomplete/incorrect — a year as a date keeps its ordinal period and needs a day/month.
✅ Rođena je 3. 8. 1995.
She was born on August 3, 1995.
❌ Kava košta 1.80 eura.
Incorrect — the decimal mark is a comma in Croatian.
✅ Kava košta 1,80 eura.
The coffee costs 1.80 euros.
❌ Donesi voće, npr jabuke.
Incorrect — the abbreviation 'npr.' takes a period.
✅ Donesi voće, npr. jabuke.
Bring fruit, e.g. apples.
Key takeaways
- Write ordinals as a digit plus a period:
1.,5.,21.— the period encodes a declining ordinal adjective. - Dates are day–month–year with periods; the year keeps its period, and the month is genitive when a day is given (lipanj → lipnja).
- Decimal is a comma; the currency is the euro (€) since 2023.
- Learn the everyday abbreviations (npr., itd., tj., str., br., g., gđa) — most end in a period, and g. means both "Mr." and "year."
Now practice Croatian
Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.
Start learning Croatian→Related Topics
- PunctuationA2 — Croatian comma, quotation marks, and sentence punctuation conventions.
- Ordinal NumbersA1 — First, second, third — and the period that writes them.
- Genitive in Time ExpressionsB1 — Dates, parts of the day, and durations in the genitive.
- Reading Numbers, Years, and Prices AloudA2 — How to say large numbers, years, and amounts.
- Days, Months, and SeasonsA1 — The week, Croatia's striking NATIVE month names (siječanj, not januar), and the seasons — plus the rule that splits 'on Monday' (u + accusative) from 'in May' (u + locative).