Japanese basics

Japanese numbers

Japanese numbers are regular: learn 1 to 10 and you can build every number up to 99 by stacking them. This page gives 0 to 10, the tens, hundreds and thousands, the readings that change, and the second set of "native" numbers used for counting things. Each one is written in kanji, in hiragana and in romaji, so it doubles as reading practice once you know hiragana.

Japanese numbers 1 to 10

Three numbers have two readings. yon, nana and kyū are the safe everyday choices; shi, shichi and ku survive in fixed expressions such as months (しがつ, shigatsu, April; しちがつ, shichigatsu, July; くがつ, kugatsu, September) and hours (よじ, yoji, four o'clock, but しちじ, shichiji, seven o'clock, and くじ, kuji, nine o'clock). Many people avoid shi because it also means "death".

11 to 99: stack the digits

Eleven is "ten one", twenty is "two ten", twenty-one is "two ten one". No new words are needed.

100, 1,000 and 10,000

Hundreds and thousands follow the same logic, with a few sound changes to make the words easier to say: 300 is sanbyaku, 600 is roppyaku, 800 is happyaku, 3,000 is sanzen and 8,000 is hassen. Japanese then counts in units of ten thousand (まん, man): 100,000 is "ten man" and one million is "one hundred man".

A price such as 2,480 yen is read piece by piece: にせんよんひゃくはちじゅうえん, nisen yonhyaku hachijū en.

The native numbers: hitotsu to tō

Japanese has a second, older set of numbers from one to ten. They are used to count objects without a specific counter word ("one thing, two things"), in shops and restaurants (ラーメンをふたつ, rāmen o futatsu, two ramen), and for a child's age. From eleven onwards, only the Chinese-origin numbers above are used.

Counting people, and counters in general

Japanese attaches a counter word to numbers, a little like "two sheets of paper" or "three cups of tea", except that almost everything has one. You do not need them all at once. The first two to learn are people, 〜にん (nin), whose first two are irregular (ひとり, hitori, one person; ふたり, futari, two people; then さんにん, sannin), and the all-purpose 〜つ above. Add 〜えん (en, yen), 〜じ (ji, o'clock) and 〜さい (sai, years old) and you can shop, tell the time and say your age.

Tips for remembering Japanese numbers

• Read the hiragana column out loud rather than the romaji: numbers are among the first words you will see written in kana on price tags and timetables.
• Count real things around you during the day: steps, stairs, coins.
• Say phone numbers digit by digit. Zero is ゼロ or れい, and the dash is の (no).
• The doubled consonants in みっつ, ろっぴゃく or はっせん are written with a small っ: see the pronunciation guide for how they sound.

Practice with Kanapup

Every number above is written in hiragana. Learn the characters row by row in the app, and this page becomes something you can read.

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