Danish Dates & Years

Danish dates use a day-first format and an ordinal number for the day. Years are usually read in two parts. Both are straightforward once you've seen a few examples.

Writing the date

The Danish written format is day.month.year (with dots, not slashes):

• 05.06.2026 = 5th of June 2026
• 24.12.2025 = 24th of December 2025

Sometimes you'll also see den 5. juni 2026 written out — note the period after the day, signalling an ordinal number.

Saying the date

Read the day as an ordinal and the month as its name:

The article den is required before the date in Danish — like "the" in "the 5th of June".

Reading years aloud

For years before 2000, Danish breaks the number into two pairs:

• 1985 = nittenhundredefemogfirs or nitten femogfirs ("nineteen eighty-five")
• 1999 = nittenhundredenioghalvfems
• 1066 = ti seksogtres ("ten sixty-six")

For years after 2000, you usually hear them spoken as a single number:

• 2024 = to tusind og fireogtyve ("two thousand and twenty-four")
• 2026 = to tusind og seksogtyve