Points of the compass

The points of the compass are directions used in navigation and mapping. They help people know where they are and where they are going. The main directions, called cardinal directions, are north, east, south, and west. These four directions are spaced evenly apart, each 90 degrees from the next.

Besides these four main directions, there are also four extra directions in between them. These are called ordinal or intercardinal directions: northeast, southeast, southwest, and northwest. In some areas like weather studies and sea navigation, even more small directions are used.

Having these compass points makes it easy to talk about directions without needing to use numbers or degrees. It is a simple way to describe where something is or where to go.

Designations

Several terms redirect here. For other uses, see Northeast (disambiguation), Northwest (disambiguation), Southeast (disambiguation) and Southwest (disambiguation).

The names of the compass point directions follow these rules:

8-wind compass rose

• The four cardinal directions are north (N), east (E), south (S), west (W), at 90° angles on the compass rose.
• The four intercardinal (or ordinal) directions are formed by bisecting the above, giving: northeast (NE), southeast (SE), southwest (SW), and northwest (NW). In English and many other tongues, these are compound words. Different style guides for the four mandate spaces, dashes, or none.
  • In many languages, the part meaning north or south precedes the part meaning east or west.
  • In Chinese, Vietnamese, Gaelic, and less commonly Japanese, the part meaning east or west precedes the other.
  • In some languages, the intercardinals have distinct words.
• The eight principal winds (or main winds) are the set union of the cardinals and intercardinals. Taken in turn, each is 45° from the next. These form the 8-wind compass rose, the rose at its usual basic level today.

16-wind compass rose

• The eight half-winds are the direction points obtained by bisecting the angles between the principal winds. The half-winds are north-northeast (NNE), east-northeast (ENE), east-southeast (ESE), south-southeast (SSE), south-southwest (SSW), west-southwest (WSW), west-northwest (WNW), and north-northwest (NNW). The name of each half-wind is constructed by combining the names of the principal winds to either side, with the cardinal wind coming first and the intercardinal wind second.
• The eight principal winds and the eight half-winds together form the 16-wind compass rose, with each compass point at a 22+1⁄2° angle from its two neighbours.

32-wind compass rose

• The sixteen quarter-winds are the direction points obtained by bisecting the angles between each of the points in the 16 sets of two adjacent points on the 16-wind compass rose (above). The resulting directions, named quarter-winds, are as follows (here arranged by quadrant, or in other words clockwise):
  • in NE quadrant: north by east (NbE), northeast by north (NEbN), northeast by east (NEbE), and east by north (EbN);
  • in SE quadrant: east by south (EbS), southeast by east (SEbE), southeast by south (SEbS), and south by east (SbE);
  • in SW quadrant: south by west (SbW), southwest by south (SWbS), southwest by west (SWbW), and west by south (WbS);
  • in NW quadrant: west by north (WbN), northwest by west (NWbW), northwest by north (NWbN), and north by west (NbW)
• All of the points in the 16-wind compass rose plus the sixteen quarter-winds together form the 32-wind compass rose.
• In summary, the 32-wind compass rose comes from the eight principal winds, eight half-winds, and sixteen quarter-winds combined, with each compass point at an 11+1⁄4° angle from the next.

Half- and quarter-points

By the middle of the 18th century, the 32-point system had been further extended by using half- and quarter-points to give a total of 128 directions. These fractional points are named by appending, for example, ⁠1/4⁠east, ⁠1/2⁠east, or ⁠3/4⁠east to the name of one of the 32 points.

Maritime Use

Prior to the modern three-figure method of describing directions (using the 360° of a circle), the 32-point compass was used for directions on most ships, especially among European crews. The smallest unit of measure recognized was 'one point', 1/32 of a circle, or 11+1⁄4°. In the mariner's exercise of "boxing the compass", all thirty-two points of the compass are named in clockwise order.

128 compass directions

The table below shows how each of the 128 directions are named.

Traditional Mediterranean compass points

Long ago, sailors in the Mediterranean Sea created a special way to name directions using eight main winds. This was done during the Middle Ages. They used names mostly from Italian and other languages spoken around the sea, like Ligurian, Venetian, Sicilian, Provençal, Catalan, Greek, and Arabic.

These names were used on old maps called portolan charts. The eight main wind names are:

• (N) – Tramontana
• (NE) – Greco (or Bora in some places)
• (E) – Levante (sometimes Oriente)
• (SE) – Scirocco (or Exaloc in Catalan)
• (S) – Ostro (or Mezzogiorno in Venetian)
• (SW) – Libeccio (or Garbino, Eissalot in Provençal)
• (W) – Ponente (or Zephyrus in Greek)
• (NW) – Maestro (or Mistral in Provençal)

The compass points were also shown in colors on these old maps. Black was used for the eight main winds, green for the eight half-winds, and red for the sixteen quarter-winds.

Each half-wind name is made by mixing the names of two main winds. For example, NNE is called "Greco-Tramontana". The quarter winds have special Italian phrases like "Quarto di X verso Y", meaning one quarter from X towards Y.

Chinese compass points

In ancient China, during the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, people used a special compass with 24 directions for navigation. These directions were linked to the twelve Earthly Branches, which are also used in the Chinese zodiac. Sometimes, a single direction is marked with the word 單 (meaning single) or 丹.

Directions in between the main ones are named by combining two nearby points, similar to how we say "northwest" in English. For example, 癸子 means the direction halfway between 子 and 癸, which is 7 and a half degrees. This type of compass is called a double-needle (雙針) compass.