# How do you write the number seven? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 18, 2019, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956 "2019-10-18T14:12:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/21 "2019-10-18T17:07:45Z")
“Se7en” ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/22 "2019-10-18T18:16:21Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > “Se7en” This package came for you. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/23 "2019-10-18T18:21:52Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > This package came for you. WHAT’S lN THE BOX?! ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/24 "2019-10-18T18:34:01Z")
Sthreeseventhreen. ---
**Author:** ![Les\_Espaces\_Du\_Sommeil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/les_espaces_du_sommeil/32/308_2.png) [@Les\_Espaces\_Du\_Sommeil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Les_Espaces_Du_Sommeil)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/25 "2019-10-18T18:37:12Z")
Without a slash if I write in English. With a slash otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Bayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bayaker/32/3454_2.png) [@Bayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bayaker)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/26 "2019-10-18T18:56:08Z")
I cross my sevens(and zees) because I was a nerdy smarty-pants as a kid, thought it looked kind of ‘Old World’, and that’s the way my grandmother did it. ---
**Author:** ![Jet\_Jaguar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jet_jaguar/32/3562_2.png) [@Jet\_Jaguar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jet_Jaguar)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/27 "2019-10-18T19:07:36Z")
I’m an engineer and I started slashing my 7’s and Z’s in college to reduce ambiguity when writing out lots of equations in homework and classroom lecture notes. I’ve since fallen out of the habit with 7, but still do when I write the letter Z. ---
**Author:** ![stretch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a6a055/32.png) [@stretch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stretch)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/28 "2019-10-18T19:19:39Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > I put a slash through my sevens 90% of the time. This sounds right. I started slashing when my 1 and 7 started looking too much alike. But when doing quick math that won’t be seen again, I may not slash. ---
**Author:** ![Noelq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/noelq/32/16438_2.png) [@Noelq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noelq)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/29 "2019-10-18T19:21:05Z")
IT guy. Seven with a slash, Zero with a slash, and if needed, One with a slash. It makes a huge f\*\*king difference when you’re handwriting down a code for something. ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/30 "2019-10-18T19:45:55Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > WHAT’S lN THE BOX?! Two movies, a slasher flick & [this](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054047/). Without; the proper 'Murican way for me. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/31 "2019-10-18T23:16:38Z")
No slash for me. I hear the slash is supposed to distinguish the sevens from the ones. I don’t remember ever mistaking an unslashed seven for a one, although I have had trouble distinguishing slashed sevens from fours or nines. Knock off slashing sevens people. It’s confusing, and it looks stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hilarity_n.suze/32/6223_2.png) [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2019, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/32 "2019-10-18T23:26:22Z")
I went to first grade in Germany, on an AFB, and the example up on the wall had a slash, and that’s what we learned. Then back in the US of A I got told that the slash was wrong. But I’m stubborn. I also thought, “Hey, now I’m unique.” Oddly enough, almost everyone whose numbers I’ve encountered for one reason or another in my professional life has also used the European 7, with a slash, enough for me to think that basically this is what everybody does. I’m not unique, and I tend to work with peole with affectations I guess. At one point I learned that my boss did it for pretty much the same reason I did, and as it turned out, learned it on exactly the same German AFB, probably the same thing on the same wall (but not at the same time). ETA: Going along with this, I also do an upstroke on the “1” so I really do need a slash to differentiate it. Not that I write a lot of numbers. ---
**Author:** ![RollOutTheBarrel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rolloutthebarrel/32/1649_2.png) [@RollOutTheBarrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RollOutTheBarrel)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/33 "2019-10-19T00:35:10Z")
I write my sevens without a slash. It’s how I learned in school (in the US). In seventh grade, a friend of mine (who had gone to a different school in lower grades) once “corrected” my sevens on my math homework by drawing a slash through each of them. I had never seen that before so I was like, “Why did you cross out all of my sevens?!” ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/34 "2019-10-19T00:47:42Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > I write an unadorned 7. It’s the American thing to do, unlike that horizontal slash Euro-affectation. I literally learned the slashed 7 thing in third grade from a “European” teaching assistant, who mentioned it in passing while talking about a different subject and noted how it was a European style. I thought that was cool in the 3rd grade and have continued doing it that way ever since. Need I explain that I learned this in an effete San Francisco public school, which I’m sure only just barely qualifies as American :p? ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/35 "2019-10-19T02:07:17Z")
I just remembered that I first learned about crossed sevens in a puzzle book I read when I was in elementary school. One of the puzzles involved an incorrectly worked out addition problem, which became correct when you turned it upside down and read the digits as letters. In the problem, the sevens were crossed and became lower-case "t"s when turned upside down. The cross confused me at first because I’d never seen it before. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/36 "2019-10-19T02:23:54Z")
> [@Noelq](#): > > IT guy. > > Seven with a slash, Zero with a slash, and if needed, One with a slash. > > It makes a huge f\*\*king difference when you’re handwriting down a code for something. Yup, sevens, ones and Zs all get slashes for the same reason that you mention (also IT guy). I write the Hindu style 7 - it’s essentially like the 7 in the Calibri or Verdana type faces, but with a slash. ---
**Author:** ![ekedolphin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ekedolphin/32/10003_2.png) [@ekedolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekedolphin)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/37 "2019-10-19T02:46:13Z")
I write my 7s in the European style; it was one of many things in which Grandpa found fault with me. ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/38 "2019-10-19T03:17:59Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Never with a slash. But often with a hint of a serif at the top (somewhere between the two 7s shown here: [File:Sevens.svg - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sevens.svg)). I do the first one. I hear that’s standard in Japan (where I grew up) and Korea. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/39 "2019-10-19T03:23:30Z")
> [@ekedolphin](#): > > I write my 7s in the European style; it was one of many things in which Grandpa found fault with me. Is this the first line of a novel? ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2019, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956/40 "2019-10-19T07:19:05Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Is this the first line of a novel? A murder mystery. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-you-write-the-number-seven/841956.md?page=3)