Punctuation to introduce a list: comma vs. colon vs. nothing

Which of these sentences is written correctly?

  1. Angela has three brothers, Mark, Adam, and Ryan.
  2. Angela has three brothers: Mark, Adam, and Ryan.
  3. Angela has three brothers Mark, Adam, and Ryan

Angela has three brothers: Mark, Adam, and Ryan.

That's the one to go with.

N.B. This is called the syntactical-descriptive function of the colon: it "introduces a description—in particular, makes explicit the elements of a set" (Wikipedia)


Angela has three brothers: Mark, Adam, and Ryan.