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How do you say “plus” and “minus” in Spanish? Today we’ll finish learning how to count to ten, plus we’ll learn how to do math in Spanish so that we can say things like “two plus seven equals nine”.
Ocho, nueve, diez…
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Today we’re going to learn three new numbers in Spanish, and we’ll get lots of both speaking and listening practice with all the numbers we’ve learned so far. While we do, we’ll also continue practicing the verbs Llamar, Parecer, and Salir.
So far, we’ve learned the Spanish numbers uno, dos, tres, cuatro, cinco, seis, and siete. Our next number is ocho, which means “eight”. For example:
The little girl was seven or eight years old.
La niña tenía siete u ocho años.
The word for “nine” is nueve, spelled n-u-e-v-e. For example:
This year there are nine new houses on my street.
Este año hay nueve casas nuevas en mi calle.
Let’s go ahead and just practice these.
The girl is seven years old and the boy is eight.
La niña tiene siete años y el niño tiene ocho.
I think they have eight or nine new things.
Creo que tienen ocho o nueve cosas nuevas.
The word for “ten” in Spanish is diez. For example:
There are ten of us.
Somos diez.
OK, that’s not a literal translation, but that IS the most common way to describe how many of you there are; you typically literally just say “we are ten”.
Let’s get some practice with ocho, nueve, and diez, and I’ll also throw in some of our other numbers for good practice.
The kids of the class are ten years old.
Los chicos de la clase tienen diez años.
Those kids are between eight and ten years old.
Esos chicos tienen entre ocho y diez años.
We think he is nine or ten.
Creemos que tiene nueve o diez.
There are nine of us, so we’re going to be able to.
Somos nueve, así que vamos a poder.
Six or seven people went to that party.
Seis o siete personas fueron a esa fiesta.
Tonight there are going to be four or five of us, I’m not sure (m).
Esta noche vamos a ser cuatro o cinco, no estoy seguro.
Three people have gone out; I think I will call him.
Tres personas han salido, creo que lo llamaré.
All right, now we’ve found with our students that thinking about numbers in a second language is a particularly tricky skill. It’s hard enough to think in a second language, but trying to do tricky things in both language and math at the same time is a lot of mental work! But let’s get a start on this so that we can lay a good foundation for when things get really complicated later. In this episode, we’re going to present some of the basics of how to do math in Spanish, specifically adding and subtracting.
Here’s a very simple example:
Four plus two are six.
Cuatro más dos son seis.
So this is a new use of más that we haven’t learned yet. The sentence literally sounds like “four more two are six”, but that’s because this word más has another meaning: as a preposition, it means “plus”. Try it yourself in this next example:
Three plus seven are ten.
Tres más siete son diez.
All right, now let’s go in the opposite direction.
Ten minus four is six.
Diez menos cuatro son seis.
So here we’re using menos to mean “minus”. And notice that we say son seis, not es seis; in English we sometimes say “is” before a plural number, but in Spanish you should stick to the plural conjugation son unless the number is uno.
All right, let’s practice some math in Spanish.
Nine plus one is ten.
Nueve más uno son diez.
Ten minus seven is three.
Diez menos siete son tres.
Seven minus five is two.
Siete menos cinco son dos.
Six plus two is eight.
Seis más dos son ocho.
Ten minus eight is two.
Diez menos ocho son dos.
Nine minus eight is one.
Nueve menos ocho es uno.
Nine minus four is five.
Nueve menos cuatro son cinco.
All right, we’re going to do this just a little bit more, but first let’s learn two more terms. To say “equals”, you’ll say es igual a. So for example:
Four plus four equals eight.
Cuatro más cuatro es igual a ocho.
So in that case, you DO use the singular, es, specifically because it’s part of the idiom “is equal to”.
And then here’s how you ask a math question in Spanish:
What is nine minus three?
¿Cuánto es nueve menos tres?
So you start with ¿cuánto es?, literally “how much is?”
Let’s practice. In this quiz, you’ll specifically use es igual a when you hear the word “equals”; otherwise you can just stick with son or es.
What is six plus two?
¿Cuánto es seis más dos?
Three plus one equals four.
Tres más uno es igual a cuatro.
Ten minus seven is three.
Diez menos siete son tres.
Ten minus two equals eight.
Diez menos dos es igual a ocho.
Five plus four is nine.
Cinco más cuatro son nueve.
How much is nine minus four?
¿Cuánto es nueve menos cuatro?
Three plus five equals eight.
Tres más cinco es igual a ocho.
All right, let’s get a lot more practice with math and numbers, along with our new verbs from earlier this week, using our final quiz. (And remember that to see these as flashcards, you can access the free online flashcards here!)
In this first example, translate “you don’t seem to be fine” as no pareces estar bien.
You don’t seem to be fine, I’m going to go with you, but I leave in an hour.
No pareces estar bien, voy a ir contigo, pero salgo en una hora.
They go out with those ten people.
Ellos salen con esas diez personas.
It seemed to us like a good idea that he go out tonight.
Nos pareció una buena idea que él salga esta noche.
She calls her every day because she is nine years old.
La llama todos los días porque tiene nueve años.
We went out yesterday, but she goes out today because she’s the boss.
Salimos ayer, pero ella sale hoy porque es la jefa.
They don’t want him to go out for nine hours.
No quieren que él salga por nueve horas.
Go out and call your father! The police officer is already here.
¡Sal y llama a tu padre! El policía ya está aquí.
Eight minus two are six.
Ocho menos dos son seis.
(formal, masculine) Go out! I will call you when I have time.
¡Salga! Lo llamaré cuando tenga tiempo.
Do you go out every day at that time?
¿Sales todos los días a esa hora?
The president and the queen seem to us like bad people.
El presidente y la reina nos parecen malas personas.
It seemed to me that he had called the doctor.
Me parecía que él había llamado al doctor.
Three plus two is five.
Tres más dos son cinco.
The professor has gone out, but the agent is still here.
El profesor ha salido, pero el agente aún está aquí.
Someone is knocking at the door, go out! (plural)
Alguien está llamando a la puerta, ¡salgan!
Eight minus seven is one.
Ocho menos siete es uno.
I went out on the weekend and that’s why they are calling him now.
Yo salí el fin de semana y por eso lo llaman ahora.
Nine plus one is ten.
Nueve más uno son diez.
Can you call me later? I’m with eight friends(f) now.
¿Me puedes llamar después? Estoy con ocho amigas ahora.
Why are you calling her now? Yesterday we went out with her.
¿Por qué la llamas ahora? Ayer salimos con ella.
He has seemed to us like a good teacher.
Nos ha parecido un buen maestro.
She didn’t call us on time and now we want them to go out.
Ella no nos llamó a tiempo y ahora queremos que salgan.
(formal) Go out! There are nine or ten people here.
¡Salga! Hay nueve o diez personas aquí.
They want us to go out for eight hours.
Quieren que salgamos por ocho horas.
Six plus one is seven.
Seis más uno son siete.
Go out! It has to seem like a good idea to you.
¡Sal! Te tiene que parecer una buena idea.
Five minus two is three.
Cinco menos dos son tres.
Let’s go out! The king doesn’t seem sad.
¡Salgamos! El rey no parece triste.
Seven plus three is ten.
Siete más tres son diez.
I’m calling them now because he went out without telling them.
Los llamo ahora porque él salió sin decirles.
Eight minus one is seven.
Ocho menos uno son siete.
We’re going to go out partying this weekend.
Vamos a salir de fiesta este fin de semana.
We aren’t going out these days.
No estamos saliendo estos días.
Do you go out with someone that is called Martín?
¿Sales con alguien que se llama Martín?
He is a master of those ten things.
Él es un maestro de esas diez cosas.
It has to come out fast!
¡Tiene que salir rápido!
To get more practice with these sentences, join the free course here and quiz yourself with them until you’re acing this.
This show is brought to you by LearnCraftSpanish.com. Our music was provided by the Seattle Marimba Quartet, and I’m Timothy, encouraging you to do the hard work of learning Spanish. Acquiring a second language is one of the most fulfilling things you can do, so start your fluency journey today using our free course — join here.
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