Vocabulary List
数字 (sūji)
Count from zero to ten thousand — the foundation for prices, time, dates, and phone numbers.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 零 / ゼロ | rei / zero | zero |
| 一 | ichi | one |
| 二 | ni | two |
| 三 | san | three |
| 四 | yon / shi | four |
| 五 | go | five |
| 六 | roku | six |
| 七 | nana / shichi | seven |
| 八 | hachi | eight |
| 九 | kyū / ku | nine |
| 十 | jū | ten |
| 十一 | jūichi | eleven |
| 二十 | nijū | twenty |
| 三十 | sanjū | thirty |
| 四十 | yonjū | forty |
| 五十 | gojū | fifty |
| 百 | hyaku | hundred |
| 五百 | gohyaku | five hundred |
| 千 | sen | thousand |
| 万 | man | ten thousand |
Japanese numbers run on two parallel systems: the Sino-Japanese readings shown here (ichi, ni, san...), used for counting, math, dates, and money, and a native Japanese set (hitotsu, futatsu, mittsu...) used for counting generic objects up to ten. Notice that 4 and 7 each have two readings — yon/shi and nana/shichi. Many Japanese speakers avoid shi for "four" because it's a homophone of 死 (death), and avoid ku for "nine" because it sounds like 苦 (suffering), especially in hospitals, hotels, and gift-giving.
Numbers are often written in kana before kanji clicks — our trainers get the 46 characters of each script locked in fast.