Skip to content

Counting

Sidney edited this page Feb 13, 2023 · 3 revisions

There are 2 ways of counting in Japanese Wago and Kango. For greater numbers than ten, Kango is usually used.

Number KANGO KANGO Reading WAGO WAGO Reading
1 いち 一つ ひとつ
2 二つ ふたつ
3 さん 三つ みっつ
4 し / よん 四つ よっつ
5 五つ いつつ
6 ろく 六つ むっつ
7 なな / しち 七つ ななつ
8 はち 八つ やっつ
9 きゅう 九つ ここのつ
10 じゅう とお
100 ひゃく - -
1,000 せん - -
10,000 まん - -
100,000 十万 じゅうまん - -
1,000,000 (million) 百万 ひゃくまん - -
100,000,000 (hundred million) おく - -
1,000,000,000 (billion) 十億 じゅうおく - -
1,000,000,000,000 (trillion) ちょう - -
10,000,000,000,000,000 (quadrillion) - -

There are three ways to say 0:

  • The Japanese word 零 (れい), but it's hardly used in modern day Japanese. Still used with temperatures, 0° for example
  • The borrowed Katakana word ゼロ, is the most popular
  • One can also say 丸 (まる), which technically means "circle". Nowadays only used in building numbers, 202 for example
Number Breakdown Kanji Kango Breakdown Kango Number
11 10 + 1 十一 じゅう + いち じゅういち
90 9 + 10 九十 きゅう + じゅう きゅうじゅう
99 9 + 10 + 9 九十九 きゅう + じゅう + きゅう きゅうじゅうきゅう
100
1984

Articles to counting:

Clone this wiki locally