
Numerals or figures are the [glyphs](/glossary/glyph) in a [typeface](/glossary/typeface) that represent numbers. In many [fonts](/glossary/font), it’s possible to select different kinds of numerals intended for different uses.

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![The four flavors of numerals, shown with backgrounds to highlight their different widths, each followed by an example of how different they appear when used in body copy.](images/thumbnail.svg)

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Numerals can either be “lining” (uppercase-like), or “oldstyle” (lowercase-like), or “proportional” (with varying character width), or “tabular” (with a unified character width, a la [monospaced](/glossary/monospaced) [type](/glossary/type)). Therefore, there are effectively four flavors of numeral. Explore them at length in our article, [“Understanding numerals”](/lesson/understanding_numerals).
