Numbers

Numbers in Japanese initially, before learning counters are probably simpler than those in English. In Japanese, up until the number 100, all numbers follow the same pattern of combining previous numbers together. Even after 100, this pattern continues, with some slight variations in pronunciation for the values of 300, 600, 800, 3000 and 8000 (for numbers up to 10000) Starting with 1-10, which become the base of the rest of the numbers:

 

Number 1 to 10

English Kanji Hiragana
1 いち
2
3 さん
4 し or よん
5
6 ろく
7 しち or なな
8 はち
9 きゅう or く
10 じゅう

 

Number 11 to 19

After 10, the pattern repeats, adding じゅう before all of the numbers up to 20.

English Kanji Hiragana
11 十一 じゅういち
12 十二 じゅうに
13 十三 じゅうさん
14 十四 じゅうし or じゅうよん
15 十五 じゅうご
16 十六 じゅうろく
17 十七 じゅうしち or じゅうなな
18 十八 じゅうはち
19 十九 じゅうきゅう or じゅうく

 

Number 20 to 30

After 10, the pattern repeats, adding じゅう before all of the numbers up to next 10s.

English Kanji Hiragana
21 二十一 にじゅういち
22 二十二 にじゅうに
23 二十三 にじゅうさん
24 二十四 にじゅうし or にじゅうよん
25 二十五 にじゅうご
26 二十六 にじゅうろく
27 二十七 にじゅうしち or にじゅうなな
28 二十八 にじゅうはち
29 二十九 にじゅうきゅう or にじゅうく
30 三十 さんじゅう

 

Number 10 to 90

This pattern is repeated until 99, where at 100, a new character is introduced.

English Kanji Hiragana
10 じゅう
20 二十 にじゅう
30 三十 さんじゅう
40 四十 よんじゅう or しじゅう
50 五十 ごじゅう
60 六十 ろくじゅう
70 七十 ななじゅう or しちじゅう
80 八十 はちじゅう
90 九十 きゅうじゅう

 

Over 100

There are special characters for some numbers

English Kanji Hiragana
100 ひゃく
1,000 せん
10,000 まん
100,000,000 おく
1,000,000,000,000 ちょう
10,000,000,000,000,000 けい

 

After 100, certain pronunciations change slightly, however all of the values of 1-99 have the same pronunciations as before. For example, 432 would be 四百三十二 or よんひゃくさんじゅうに. The value for 1000 is 千 or せん with the pronunciation pattern repeating again. For example, 5138 would be 五千百三十八 or ごせんひゃくさんじゅうはち.

 

  • 0 (Zero) in Japanese is generally 零(れい)or ゼロ.
  • Negative Numbers: Say マイナス followed by the number normally.
  • Decimals: Generally, you would say ゼロ or 零 followed by 点(てん)which represents the decimal point. After the decimal point, read each digit as its own number. So 0.013 would be read as 零点零一三 (れいてんれいいちさん) OR ゼロ点ゼロ一三 (ゼロてんゼロいちさん)