Why would you start with '5' and not '20'? :)

Many traditions have their quirks. But at least very few German-speakers will try to defend this format.

I feel you...I'm not German myself. It's quite annoying, and every time I want to be sure that the number I speak is understood properly, I give it number by number. I've seen too many Germans having issues with that myself, and it's just too risky with foreigners.

Interestingly, I've rarely seen it being an issue with dates. Maybe because the amount is too small and people got used to it.

I think their point is that the American date format is natural in the context of English grammar. Which it is, but written dates serve more purposes than acting as a record of things people said.

This is my point too: all of this is not "human-friendly" but "American-friendly" or in the case of dates "english-friendly".

Also the standard in French. Day (optional ordinal) Month.

Same in Polish.

Optional ordinal? Afaik for some reason day 1 is always ordinal (1er mai) and the others are always cardinal (25 mars)

Sorry yes you’re right, “optional” was the wrong word to use.

“fünfundzwanzigster märz zweitausenddreiundzwanzig”

What I’m impressed with is the duration of time it takes to say todays date in Germany. I guess it’s rather “German-friendly” though. ;-)

It's just 2 syllables more than in English, is that really that much of a difference?

It looks longer than it is if you speak it though.

It looks scary too btw. Had to double-check it too because you rarely write it as words in German (I'm not German too).

Even in English 25th of March is perfectly valid expression, so not sure if OPs point is really valid.

On the other hand, the German way of speaking numbers with the order of just the 2 least significant digits flipped between numerical notation and speaking/writing is also easier explained by culture and history, rather than good logic.

The English equivalent for 1125 would be onethousand-onehundred-five-and-twenty.