German Numbers: How to Count from 1 to 1000

10/22/2025 Languages & Culture Learning & Grammar created by Sprachcaffe Team

German numbers look forbidding as long compounds, but they follow a handful of rules, including saying the units before the tens.

German numbers look intimidating at first, with their long one-word compounds, but they follow a small set of consistent rules. Once you know the numbers up to twenty, the tens, and the one quirk that trips up every beginner (units come before tens), you can build any number up to a thousand. This guide gives you the lists with pronunciation, the formation rules, and the small spelling points to watch.

The numbers 1 to 20

These are the building blocks, so it is worth learning them by heart. The pronunciation guide is a rough English approximation.

Number	German	Pronunciation
1	eins	ines (like “nice”)
2	zwei	tsvy
3	drei	dry
4	vier	feer
5	fünf	fuenf (ü as in French “tu”)
6	sechs	zeks
7	sieben	ZEE-ben
8	acht	akht
9	neun	noyn
10	zehn	tsayn
11	elf	elf
12	zwölf	tsvurlf (ö as in “fur”)
13	dreizehn	DRY-tsayn
14	vierzehn	FEER-tsayn
15	fünfzehn	FUENF-tsayn
16	sechzehn	ZEKH-tsayn
17	siebzehn	ZEEP-tsayn
18	achtzehn	AKHT-tsayn
19	neunzehn	NOYN-tsayn
20	zwanzig	TSVAN-tsikh

Age: 18+

Germany

Charming villages, green cities.

Age: 12-21

Germany

Learn German with pretzel power!

The tens

The tens all end in -zig, with one exception: thirty is dreißig, spelled with ß.

Number	German
10	zehn
20	zwanzig
30	dreißig
40	vierzig
50	fünfzig
60	sechzig
70	siebzig
80	achtzig
90	neunzig
100	(ein)hundert

The big quirk: units before tens

This is the rule that catches everyone out. For any number from 21 to 99, German says the unit first, then "und" (and), then the ten, all as one word. So 21 is literally "one-and-twenty": einundzwanzig. Note that eins loses its s inside the compound (ein-, not eins-). A few worked examples make the pattern clear:

Number	German
21	einundzwanzig
25	fünfundzwanzig
29	neunundzwanzig
32	zweiunddreißig
38	achtunddreißig
47	siebenundvierzig
76	sechsundsiebzig
99	neunundneunzig

Hundreds and thousands

Beyond a hundred, you simply string the parts together, still as one word. A hundred is (ein)hundert, and you add the rest straight on: 101 is (ein)hunderteins, 234 is zweihundertvierunddreißig (two-hundred-four-and-thirty). A thousand is (ein)tausend, so 2025 is zweitausendfünfundzwanzig. German writes these as a single long word right up to a million, which is why the numbers look so long, but they are built from parts you already know.

One example in use: Das kostet dreihundert Euro (that costs three hundred euros). A useful false friend Watch out for the large numbers, which do not match English. Eine Milliarde is a billion (a thousand million, 1,000,000,000), while eine Billion is a trillion (a million million). So the German Billion is not the English billion: it is a thousand times larger.

Summary

German numbers are built from the words up to twenty and the tens (all ending in -zig, except dreißig with its ß). The one rule to master is that units come before tens, joined by "und" and written as one word, so 21 is einundzwanzig and 38 is achtunddreißig. Hundreds and thousands simply add on the front (zweihundertvierunddreißig). And remember the false friend: eine Billion is a trillion, not a billion. Practise these out loud on a German course in Germany with SPRACHCAFFE.

FAQ

German numbers are built from a small set of roots plus consistent rules. You learn one to twenty, then the tens, and combine them to make everything up to a thousand. The one quirk is that units are said before tens.

In German, 21 is "einundzwanzig", literally "one and twenty". The unit comes before the ten, which mirrors the old English "four and twenty". It feels reversed to English speakers but follows a fixed, reliable pattern.

One hundred is "hundert" and one thousand is "tausend". Larger round numbers combine these, so 200 is "zweihundert" and 3000 is "dreitausend", written as single words like most German numbers.

Back