Numbers in Japanese - Ichi, Ni, San

Do you know the numbers which anime characters use in anime? Numbers like ichi 一, ni 二, san 三 and so on? No? Well, here's a post about all those Japanese numbers and only about the Japanese numbers, so you can know pretty much almost everything about them.

Contents:

• Numbers up to 10
• Difference Between Yon and Shi, Nana and Shichi
• Zero in Japanese
• Numbers over 10
• Numbers over 100
• List of Magnitudes
• 4649

Numbers up to 10

First off, the numbers from 1 to 10 in Japanese are these:

1. ichi 一
2. ni に
3. san 三
4. yon 四
   shi 四
5. go 五
6. roku 六
7. nana 七
   shichi 七
8. hachi 八
9. kyuu 九
10. jyuu 十

(this article is about numbers, check out Counting in Japanese to learn how to properly count in Japanese)

By the way, here's a video if you need to learn the pronunciation:

Difference Between Yon and Shi, Nana and Shichi

You might have noticed is that there are two words for 4 and 7, yon 四 and shi 四, nana 七 and shichi 七, and you might be asking: why are there two words for these numbers? What's their difference?

The thing is, both shi 四 and shichi 七 are on'yomi 音読み, readings of the Japanese kanji based on what they were read like in China. All the numbers above are on'yomi. However, they don't have the exact same sound as they had in Chinese, they were changed a little for Japanese.

So it turned out that it's pretty easy to mistake ichi, shi and shichi as they sound more or less the same. Thus, most of the time, when saying multiple digits or a number like "twenty four," nijuu yon 二十四, the word yon 四 is used instead of shi 四 to avoid unnecessary confusion.

Some Japanese words do use the shi 四 reading, though, like shiki 四季, for example, "the four seasons."

Zero in Japanese

The word for the number zero in Japanese can either  zero ゼロ or rei 零. The difference is that the word zero in Japanese has the same roots as the word zero in English, while rei comes from Chinese. Their meanings in Japanese, however, are pretty much the same.

Another thing is that the word maru 丸, which means "circle," also written as an actual circle, maru ◯, is often used for the digit "zero". That is, if you're saying the digits "two zero one six," you could say ni maru ichi roku 2, 0, 1, 6.

Numbers over 10

When a number if over 10 in Japanese, you just say the word jyuu 十 then the word for the other number together like this:

• jyuu ichi 十一
  Ten one. Eleven.
• jyuu ni 十二
  Ten two. Twelve.
• jyuu san 十三
  Ten three. Thirteen.
• jyuu yon 十四
  Ten four. Fourteen.
• jyuu go 十五
  Ten five. Fifteen.
• jyuu roku 十六
  Ten six. Sixteen.
• jyuu nana 十七
  Ten seven. Seventeen.
• jyuu hachi 十六
  Ten right. Eighteen.
• jyuu kyuu 十九
  Ten nine. Nineteen.

After the number 19, the number 20 and so on are said pretty much counting how many tens there is in the number. For example:

• ni jyuu 二十
  Two tens. Twenty.
• ni jyuu yon 二十四
  Two tens four. Twenty Four.
• san jyuu nana 三十七
  Three tens seven. Thirty seven.
• yon juu ni 四十二
  Four tens two. Forty two.

Numbers over 100

After 99, the numbers in Japanese from 100 and over all work in a similar way. Basically, you just put  how many of the biggest number are there, then the biggest number, then how many of the second biggest number, then the second biggest number, and so on.

• hyaku 百
  Hundred.
• hyaku ni 百二
  Hundred two.
• ni hyaku 二百
  Two hundred
• ni hyaku ni 二百二
  Two hundred two.
• ni hyaku juu 二百十
  Two hundred ten.
• ni hyaku juu ni 二百十二
  Two hundred twelve.
• ni hyaku ni juu 二百二十
  Two hundred twenty.
• ni hyaku ni juu ni 二百二十二
  Two hundred twenty two.

After that there are the words sen 千 for "thousand" and man 万 for "ten thousand." Do note that to say just "one thousand" you need to say issen 一千, and for "ten thousand," ichi man 一万.

• issen 1,000
• ichi man 10,000
• ni sen jyuu roku 2016
• kyuu sen ichi 9001
• kyuu man kyuu sen kyuu hyaku kyuu jyuu kyuu 99999

An important note is that there is no word for "one hundred thousand." Instead, you say jyuu man 十万, which would be like "ten ten thousands."

• ni jyuu man 200,000
• ni jyuu roku man 260,000
• hyaku man 1.000.000
• issen man 一千万 10.000.000

After that, instead of man man, the word oku 億 is used, meaning "one hundred million", or 10,000 × 10,000. And then, after that, icchou 一兆 is used to say "one trillion" or 10,000 × 10,000 × 10,000.

List of Magnitudes

For convenience, a list of number magnitudes in Japanese.

1. ichi 一
   One.
2. jyuu 十
   Ten
3. hyaku 百
   One hundred.
4. issen 一千
   ni sen 二千
   One thousand.
   Two thousand.
5. ichi man 一万
   ni man 二万
   Ten thousand.
   Twenty thousand.
6. jyuu man 十万
   Hundred thousand.
7. hyaku man 百万
   One million.
8. sen man 千万
   Ten million.
9. ichi oku 一億
   ni oku 二億
   One hundred million.
   Two hundred million.
10. jyuu oku 十億
    One billion.
11. hyaku oku 百億
    Ten billion.
12. issen oku 一千億
    ni sen oku 二千億
    One hundred billion.
    Two hundred billion.
13. icchou 一兆
    ni chou 二兆
    One trillion.
    Two trillion.

Now when you see characters in anime talking about how much debt they have or how much a reward or bounty is, you'll have some notion of what numbers they are talking about.

4649

Lastly, one interesting thing about Japanese numbers is that there are some slangs made literally out of them. These exist by spelling out each number as a digit, forming a word which matches the sound.

For example, 4649 is the word yoroshiku よろしく. This is because yon よん, roku ろく, shi し, ku く, are readings for the number four, six, four again, and nine in Japanese.

• yo-ro-shi-ku 4649
  Nice meeting you.
• san-kyuu 39
  Thank you.
• o-ha-yo 084
  Good morning.
• o-ya-su-mi 0833
  Good night.
• ba-i-ba-i 8181
  Bye bye
• bai-to 8110
  Part-time job
• shi-go-to 4510
  Job
• na-ni-shi-te-ru 724106
  What are you doing?

This is all like l337sp34k, so you'll rarely if ever see it in anime or real life.

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