🔍 In short. When you want to say “two by two”, “one each”, “five per person”, or “three at a time” in Italian, you reach for italian share out numbers: a small family of patterns that English handles with “each”, “per”, “apiece” or “by”. The four big workhorses are a due a due (two by two), tre per ciascuno (three each), cinque a testa (five per head, casual) and siamo in tre (there are three of us). Each pattern fits a different situation: doubled a X a X for “X at a time”, per ciascuno for formal sharing, a testa for the breezy spoken version, and in + number for grouping people. Get the four right and your Italian sounds far more native, whether you’re splitting cannoli on New Year’s Eve in Catanzaro or counting kilometres per litre on the autostrada.
This B1 guide walks through the italian share out numbers one by one, with examples from a real Italian pasticceria, a cheat sheet, a dialogue between Velleda and Giuseppe planning their cenone, and a quiz to lock in the choices. By the end you’ll know which of the italian share out numbers fits each everyday situation, from buying torrone to splitting a cake among twelve people.
Cosa impareremo oggi
👆🏻 Jump to section
- The four italian share out numbers at a glance
- A due a due, uno a uno: X at a time
- Tre per ciascuno: the share-out frame
- A testa and l’uno: the casual versions
- In due, in tre: counting the group
- Per as the all-purpose ‘per’
- Cadauno: the price-tag word
- Cheat sheet
- Dialogue at the pasticceria in Catanzaro
- Mini-challenge
- Frequently asked questions
- Related guides
The four italian share out numbers at a glance
Picture Velleda lining up trays of cannoli the morning of the cenone. She has three jobs: count items, split them between guests, and tell her brother how many people are coming to dinner. Italian gives her a different pattern for each. The italian share out numbers are not one rule but a small family, and choosing among them depends on what you are actually doing with the number.
- X at a time (one by one, two by two): a uno a uno, a due a due, a quattro a quattro.
- X each, formal (three each, two per child): tre per ciascuno, due per bambino.
- X each, casual / spoken: tre a testa, dieci euro l’uno.
- How many of us (the group): siamo in tre, in dodici al cenone.
- Per measure (per kilometre, per litre): cinque persone per maso, sette litri per cento chilometri.
The italian share out numbers do overlap a little. Tre per ciascuno and tre a testa often mean the same thing; the difference is register and tone. A due a due and in due both involve two people, but they say different things: a due a due describes how a process unfolds (children entering the shop two at a time), while in due describes the group size (the two of us together). Get the patterns sorted, and italian share out numbers stop sounding like a guessing game. The five families above cover almost every everyday situation where the italian share out numbers show up.
A due a due, uno a uno: X at a time
The first family of italian share out numbers takes the same word twice with a on both sides: a uno a uno, a due a due, a tre a tre, a quattro a quattro. This frame describes how a process happens, in steady portions, one chunk at a time. Native speakers strongly prefer the doubled a form; the Treccani usage notes flag a due a due as the better choice, with bare due a due sounding clipped.
- I bambini entravano in pasticceria a due a due per non bloccare la porta.
- Velleda ha contato i cannoli uno a uno mentre li metteva nel vassoio.
- La nonna ha distribuito i mostaccioli a quattro a quattro perché i piatti erano piccoli.
- I pasticcini si vendono a sei a sei, non se ne può comprare uno solo.
- Velleda fa salire gli ospiti in cucina a due a due perché lo spazio è poco.
Notice that uno a uno (one by one) sometimes drops the first a in writing. Both a uno a uno and uno a uno appear in print and in speech. With other numbers in this family of italian share out numbers, the doubled-preposition form is much more common: you will hear a due a due and a tre a tre, almost never bare due a due. Before a vowel the a often becomes ad for sound: a uno ad uno is the version you’ll meet most often in careful writing of italian share out numbers.
🎯 Mini-challenge: Fill in the right “X at a time” form.
- Gli invitati arrivavano ___ ___ ___ (two at a time) per evitare il traffico in cortile.
- Giuseppe ha aperto i regali ___ ___ ___ (one by one) sotto l’albero.
- I petardi li abbiamo accesi ___ ___ ___ (three at a time) sul terrazzo a mezzanotte.
- Le scatole di torrone le ho impilate ___ ___ ___ (four at a time) per non farle cadere.
👉 See answers
1. a due a due
2. uno a uno (or a uno a uno)
3. a tre a tre
4. a quattro a quattro
Tre per ciascuno: the share-out frame
The second family of italian share out numbers uses per + a word meaning “each”: per ciascuno, per persona, per bambino, per ospite, per testa. This is the formal, written, neutral way to say “X each” or “X per Y”. You meet it in invitations (“due bottiglie per ospite”), in recipes (“un uovo per persona”), in school notes (“un libro per studente”), and in the kind of sober prose where a testa would feel too casual.
- Giuseppe ha comprato tre cartellate per ciascuno dei nipoti.
- Per il brindisi serviamo due flûte per persona.
- La maestra ha distribuito un libro per bambino e una matita per ciascuno.
- Giuseppe ha già messo da parte una fetta di pitta ‘nchiusa per ciascuno.
- I petardi li abbiamo divisi cinque per ciascuno, così nessuno si lamenta.
Two small things to watch when you build italian share out numbers with per ciascuno. First, the number always goes before per: tre per ciascuno, not per ciascuno tre. Second, when the noun after per is a noun of category (bambino, persona, ospite), Italian almost always keeps it singular: due bottiglie per ospite, never per ospiti. The same pattern in English would force “per guest”, and Italian aligns with that singular usage. This singular-noun habit is one of the small signatures of natural italian share out numbers.
A testa and l’uno: the casual versions
When italian share out numbers go into ordinary conversation, the formal per ciascuno often gives way to two breezier alternatives: a testa (literally “per head”) and l’uno (literally “the one”, agreeing with the item). Both mean “each”, but they sit lower on the register dial. You would write tre euro per persona in a wedding invitation and say tre euro a testa over coffee. The meaning is identical.
- Quest’anno abbiamo previsto due bottiglie di passito a testa, forse anche tre.
- Le scatole di torrone costano otto euro l’una in pasticceria, quindici in centro.
- Abbiamo ordinato una birra a testa prima del cenone.
- I biglietti per il cinema all’aperto vengono cinque euro l’uno.
- I cugini hanno portato un dolce a testa, così non si è ripetuto nulla.
A useful rule of thumb for these casual italian share out numbers. A testa is for people: una birra a testa, dieci euro a testa. L’uno / l’una is for items being priced or counted: otto euro l’una (the boxes), tre euro l’uno (the biglietti). They are not interchangeable in every sentence. You wouldn’t say otto euro a testa if the scatole are the ones costing eight euros; you’d say otto euro l’una. People take a testa, items take l’uno. This split is one of the most useful sub-rules of the italian share out numbers system.
In due, in tre: counting the group
One pattern in the italian share out numbers family does not split anything at all: it gathers. In + number tells you how many people form a group doing something together. Siamo in tre means “there are three of us” with the strong implication “we three, together”. You hear it constantly in restaurants (“siamo in cinque”), at work (“siamo in due a finire il progetto”), in cars (“in sette non ci stiamo dentro”), and in any context where a group is acting as one.
- Per il cenone di Capodanno saremo in dodici, contando anche la cugina di Cosenza.
- Andiamo a prendere il caffè in cinque, ci stiamo in macchina senza problemi.
- Velleda e Giuseppe lavorano in pasticceria in tre, di solito, ma a Natale chiamano un’aiutante.
- Siete andati al ristorante in otto e non avete prenotato?
- In sette proprio non ci stiamo dentro quella macchina, prendiamone due.
Watch the contrast with the plain enumeration sono tre. Sono tre means “they number three”, a flat count: i pacchi sono tre, the parcels are three. Sono in tre means “they form a group of three”, with the human, collective sense: i fratelli sono in tre, the brothers are a trio. With essere, the in can sometimes be omitted, but only in a strict enumeration: sono due = there are two of them; sono in due = they form a pair, acting together. Once a verb of action follows, in is needed: lavoriamo in due, never lavoriamo due. Among the italian share out numbers, this in + number pattern is the only one that gathers rather than divides.
🎯 Mini-challenge: Choose between a testa, l’uno/l’una, per ciascuno, or in + number.
- Ho preso quattro arance, costano due euro ___ (each, items).
- Abbiamo prenotato il tavolo: stasera siamo ___ ___ (six of us).
- La maestra ha dato un quaderno ___ ___ (each pupil, formal).
- Per il brindisi prendete due flûte ___ ___ (each, casual).
- Per finire il trasloco in giornata lavoriamo ___ ___ (three of us together).
👉 See answers
1. due euro l’una (items, le arance, feminine)
2. siamo in sei
3. un quaderno per ciascuno (or per alunno)
4. due flûte a testa
5. lavoriamo in tre
Per as the all-purpose ‘per’
Outside the world of people sharing items, the italian share out numbers expand into measures, speeds, and rates with the workhorse preposition per. This is the same per as “per kilometre”, “per litre”, “per million inhabitants”. The pattern is rigid: numeral + unit + per + measure.
- Consuma solo sette litri per cento chilometri, niente male per una vecchia Punto.
- Si registrano una trentina di casi per milione di abitanti.
- Calcoliamo mediamente cinque persone per nucleo familiare nei piccoli centri della Sila.
- Il muratore chiede ottanta euro per metro quadro per le piastrelle.
One small twist for speeds and unit prices: instead of per, Italian often uses a or simply the bare article. Faceva centocinquanta chilometri all’ora, costa mille euro al chilo, il caffè viene un euro la tazzina. All three constructions coexist; the al/all’/la + measure version sounds the most everyday for speeds and prices, while per stays neutral and works everywhere. These rate-based italian share out numbers are the ones you’ll meet in newspapers, recipes, and on motorway signs.
Cadauno: the price-tag word
One last word belongs in the italian share out numbers family, but it lives almost entirely in price tags and invoices: cadauno, often shortened to cad. in writing. Maglie 20 euro cadauna, cornici 12 euro cad.. You will spot it on market stalls, on flyers, in supermarket promos, and on commercial invoices. In speech it is rare and slightly bureaucratic.
- Cornici di legno 12 euro cadauna, oggi solo in pasticceria.
- Le scatole di mostaccioli sono in offerta a 5 euro cad.
- Sulle etichette del torrone leggi sempre peso netto cadauno, non per pezzo.
Outside of price-tag context, you do not need to use cadauno at all. The casual l’uno or a testa will do the job in speech, and per ciascuno covers the formal written cases. Cadauno agrees in gender (cadauno / cadauna) and is invariable for number, which makes sense given it’s a per-unit word: there is no plural “each”. Of all the italian share out numbers, cadauno is the most register-locked: spot it on a flyer and you know you’re in commercial Italian.
Cheat sheet
One table to keep open while you build a sentence with italian share out numbers.
| Meaning | Pattern | Example | Register |
|---|---|---|---|
| X at a time | a + X + a + X | a due a due, a tre a tre | neutral, very common |
| One by one | uno a uno / a uno ad uno | contare i cannoli uno a uno | neutral |
| X each (formal) | numeral + per ciascuno / per persona | tre per ciascuno | written, formal |
| X each (people, casual) | numeral + a testa | una birra a testa | spoken, breezy |
| X each (items, price) | numeral + l’uno / l’una | otto euro l’una | neutral |
| Group of X people | (essere / verb) + in + X | siamo in dodici | neutral |
| Per measure | numeral + unit + per + measure | sette litri per cento chilometri | neutral, technical |
| Per measure (speed / price) | numeral + unit + a/al + measure | cento chilometri all’ora | everyday spoken |
| X each (price tag) | numeral + cadauno / cad. | maglie 20 euro cadauna | commercial |
Dialogue at the pasticceria in Catanzaro
Velleda and Giuseppe are finishing the last orders the morning of December 31 in their pasticceria in centro a Catanzaro. They have to count, split, price, and figure out who is coming to the cenone. Watch the italian share out numbers move through the conversation: a due a due, per ciascuno, a testa, l’una, in dodici, all in five minutes of work. The italian share out numbers tend to cluster around real tasks like this one, so the cenone is a perfect testing ground.
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: Giuse’, i cannoli li metto a due a due nel vassoio grande, così entrano tutti senza schiacciarsi.
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Bene. Quanti ne abbiamo finiti finora?
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: Li ho contati uno a uno mentre li glassavo: sessantadue. Per il cenone in famiglia ne servono almeno cinque per ciascuno.
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Stasera saremo in dodici, contando anche la cugina di Cosenza che porta il marito. Quindi sessanta cannoli giusti. Gli altri due li mangiamo noi qui adesso.
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: Affare fatto. Senti, le scatole di torrone le hai messe in vetrina con il prezzo?
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Sì. Otto euro l’una le piccole, quindici le grandi. Quelle al pistacchio invece le ho marcate dodici cadauna, perché ci abbiamo speso di più.
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: Perfetto. E la pitta ‘nchiusa?
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Tagliata a fette spesse, una a testa basta e avanza. Ne ho già messo da parte una fetta per ciascuno dei nipoti, anche per quello piccolo che non ha ancora i denti per masticarla.
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: A proposito di nipoti, i petardi? Li hanno divisi loro?
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Sì, ne hanno cinque per ciascuno. Fanno venticinque petardi in tutto, abbastanza per non farsi male e per far rumore fino all’una di notte.
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: Brindisi con il passito? Due bottiglie a testa mi sembrano troppe.
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Esagerata. Due bottiglie ogni quattro persone, semmai. Diciamo sei bottiglie in tutto, le portiamo su a due a due quando arrivano gli ospiti.
👱🏼♀️ Velleda: Allora chiudiamo la pasticceria alle sei e saliamo. In dodici a tavola, sei a destra e sei a sinistra. Buon Capodanno fin da adesso.
👨🏽🦱 Giuseppe: Buon Capodanno, Velle’. Mi raccomando: cannoli a due a due, pitta a fette, e non far cadere nulla per le scale.
What to notice in the dialogue
- A due a due twice: cannoli arranged in the tray, bottles carried up the stairs. The process happens in pairs.
- Uno a uno: Velleda counted the cannoli one by one while glazing them. The slow, item-by-item act.
- Per ciascuno three times: cannoli for the cenone, slice of pitta for the nephews, petardi divided up. The neutral share-out form.
- A testa: una fetta a testa, due bottiglie a testa. The breezy spoken equivalent of “per ciascuno”.
- L’una + cadauna: pricing the boxes of torrone. L’una for the regular ones, cadauna on the pistachio label (the price-tag variant).
- In dodici: the group size for the cenone. Not siamo dodici, but siamo in dodici.
- Ogni quattro persone: a sibling pattern with ogni, useful when you split by ratio rather than per-person.
Mini-challenge
🎯 Final challenge: Translate into natural Italian, picking the right share-out pattern.
- The children entered the bakery two at a time.
- We are eight of us at dinner tonight.
- I bought three notebooks at four euros each.
- The teacher gave one book per pupil and a sticker for each one.
- The car does seven litres per hundred kilometres.
- We had a glass of wine each before midnight.
👉 See answers
1. I bambini entravano in pasticceria a due a due.
2. Stasera a cena siamo in otto.
3. Ho comprato tre quaderni a quattro euro l’uno.
4. La maestra ha dato un libro per alunno e un adesivo per ciascuno.
5. La macchina consuma sette litri per cento chilometri.
6. Abbiamo bevuto un bicchiere di vino a testa prima di mezzanotte.
Mastering italian share out numbers comes from spotting which job the number is doing: counting a process, splitting items, sizing a group, or expressing a rate. Read examples, listen to how Italians shop, order and plan, and the patterns will start to click without rule-memorising. Pair this guide with the quiz below to lock in italian share out numbers, and come back after a week to see what stuck.
Test your understanding
Take the quiz below to test what you’ve learned about italian share out numbers.
Frequently asked questions
These questions about italian share out numbers come from real Italian learner forums and from native-speaker usage notes published by the Treccani entry on a mano a mano, a due a due.
Is it ‘a due a due’ or ‘due a due’?
Both are heard, but native usage strongly prefers the doubled-preposition form a due a due. The same goes for the related phrases of italian share out numbers: a mano a mano (better than mano a mano), a poco a poco (better than poco a poco), a faccia a faccia (better than faccia a faccia). The bare forms are not wrong, just clipped. When in doubt, double the a: a due a due, a tre a tre, a quattro a quattro. Before a vowel, the second a often becomes ad for euphony: a uno ad uno. This doubled-preposition habit is one of the small style markers of italian share out numbers in writing.
What’s the difference between a testa, ciascuno, l’uno and cadauno?
All four mean ‘each’, but they belong to different registers. A testa is casual, spoken, used with people: una birra a testa. Per ciascuno is neutral and formal, written: tre cannoli per ciascuno. L’uno (or l’una, agreeing with the item) is for prices and counted items: otto euro l’una. Cadauno (often shortened cad.) lives almost entirely on price tags and commercial invoices: maglie 20 euro cadauna. In speech, stick to a testa for people and l’uno for items. In writing, per ciascuno covers most cases.
Why ‘siamo in tre’ and not ‘siamo tre’?
Sono tre means ‘they number three’, a flat enumeration: i pacchi sono tre, the parcels are three. Siamo in tre means ‘we are a group of three’, with the strong sense of acting together: siamo in tre a lavorare su questo progetto. The in is the marker that turns the number from a count into a group label. Once an action verb follows (lavoriamo, mangiamo, andiamo), in is required: lavoriamo in tre, never lavoriamo tre. With essere alone, in can sometimes be omitted, but only as plain enumeration: sono due (there are two) vs sono in due (they form a pair acting together).
When do I use per for distribution, and when do I use a?
In italian share out numbers, per is the neutral, all-purpose option for rates and measures: sette litri per cento chilometri, cinque persone per nucleo, una trentina di casi per milione di abitanti. For speeds and unit prices, Italian often uses a / al / all’ / la instead: cento chilometri all’ora, mille euro al chilo, il caffe un euro la tazzina. The a / al construction sounds the most everyday for these specific cases. For sharing items among people, the standard pattern in italian share out numbers is numeral + per ciascuno, while a testa is its casual spoken cousin.
Can I say ‘tre ciascuno’ without ‘per’?
Yes, in informal speech: ho dato tre cioccolatini ciascuno. But the fuller per ciascuno is more common in careful Italian, especially in writing. The same goes for ciascuna with feminine items: le ragazze hanno ricevuto due rose per ciascuna. The shorter ciascuno without per drops into casual register and is more typical of spoken conversation. If you’re writing an invitation or a school note, use per ciascuno.
Is ‘a due a due’ literary or do Italians really use it?
It’s everyday Italian. You’ll hear a due a due any time something happens in pairs: kids walking into class, soldiers marching, dancers stepping, items packed in boxes, drinks served at a table. The same goes for a tre a tre, a quattro a quattro, a cinque a cinque. The pattern is not poetic or old-fashioned, just slightly more vivid than English ‘two by two’. Italians also use it to mean ‘one at a time but methodically’: contare i soldi uno a uno, mangiare le ciliegie a due a due. It belongs to the live core of italian share out numbers, not to literary reserves.
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Related guides
- Italian Ogni, Ciascuno, Ognuno: ‘Each’ and ‘Every’ (A2): the each/every family that pairs with these share-out patterns.
- Italian Numbers: Uno, Zero, Mille, Milione (A1): the building blocks (uno, due, mille) used in every share-out frame.
- Italian Numbers: Cardinals, Ordinals, Dates and Age: complete numbers guide with audio.
- Treccani: a mano a mano, a poco a poco, a due a due: native institutional note on the doubled-preposition form.
