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Cardinal direction

"Cardinal point" redirects here. For other uses, see Cardinal point (disambiguation).

A compass rose showing the four cardinal directions, the four intercardinal directions, and eight more divisions.

The four cardinal directions, or cardinal points, are the four main compass directions: north, south, east, and west, commonly denoted by their initials N, S, E, and W respectively. Relative to north, the directions east, south, and west are at 90 degree intervals in the clockwise direction.

The ordinal directions (also called the intercardinal directions) are northeast (NE), southeast (SE), southwest (SW), and northwest (NW). The intermediate direction of every set of intercardinal and cardinal direction is called a secondary intercardinal direction. These eight shortest points in the compass rose shown to the right are:

  1. West-northwest (WNW)
  2. North-northwest (NNW)
  3. North-northeast (NNE)
  4. East-northeast (ENE)
  5. East-southeast (ESE)
  6. South-southeast (SSE)
  7. South-southwest (SSW)
  8. West-southwest (WSW)

Points between the cardinal directions form the points of the compass. Arbitrary horizontal directions may be indicated by their azimuth angle value.

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