Italian Numbers: Cardinals, Ordinals, Dates and Age

🔍 In short. Italian numbers are mostly regular once you know the first twenty. The traps are few but real: uno is the only cardinal that changes for gender (un, uno, una, un’), numbers ending in -tré take an accent (ventitré), uno shortens before a noun (ventun anni), mille becomes mila in the plural (duemila), and milione/miliardo need di (un milione di euro). This A1 guide gives the cardinals and ordinals, age, dates, time and prices, with the exact points beginners get wrong.

You can count to a million in Italian after one lesson, because italian numbers are built by gluing pieces together. The work is not memorising hundreds of words; it is the handful of spelling and agreement rules that this guide drills.

---

Why numbers need a little grammar

Open a market stall, read a price tag, give your age, book table for two: italian numbers are in every basic exchange. The good news is they are built like Lego, you join pieces. The catch is four or five small rules about spelling and agreement that no one warns you about.

So this guide gives the words quickly and spends its time on what actually trips beginners up: the changing uno, the accent on -tré, the shortening before nouns, mille versus mila, and when a number means “third” instead of “three”. Master those and italian numbers stop being a guessing game.

0 to 20

The first twenty italian numbers have to be learned by heart; everything else is built from them.

• 0 zero, 1 uno, 2 due, 3 tre, 4 quattro, 5 cinque, 6 sei, 7 sette, 8 otto, 9 nove, 10 dieci
• 11 undici, 12 dodici, 13 tredici, 14 quattordici, 15 quindici, 16 sedici
• 17 diciassette, 18 diciotto, 19 diciannove, 20 venti

Notice 17 to 19 flip the order (dici- + unit) and double letters appear: diciassette, diciannove. These first twenty italian numbers are the only real memorisation in the whole topic. Pronunciation note: stress is regular and on the penultimate syllable for most (QUAttro, SEtte, NOve, DIEci, CENto), so once you hear them a few times they fall into a rhythm. Practise counting aloud from one to twenty every morning for a week and the rest of the system builds on a base you no longer have to think about.

20 to 100 and the joins

From 20 up, italian numbers are tens plus units written as one word: venti, trenta, quaranta, cinquanta, sessanta, settanta, ottanta, novanta, cento.

• Drop the final vowel of the ten before uno and otto: ventuno (21), ventotto (28), trentuno (31), quarantotto (48).
• Numbers ending in three take an accent: ventitré (23), trentatré (33), centotré (103).
• Everything else just glues: ventidue, trentacinque, settantanove, novantasei.

Uno: the only one that changes

Almost all italian numbers are invariable. The single exception is uno: as “one / a” it behaves exactly like the indefinite article.

• un libro, uno studente, una casa, un’amica
  a book, a student, a house, a friend
• Ho ventun anni. (uno shortens before a noun: ventuno → ventun)
  I’m twenty-one.
• trentun giorni, cinquantun euro
  thirty-one days, fifty-one euros

So uno is the only cardinal with a feminine (una) and the only one that loses its -o before a noun (ventun anni). Every other number among the italian numbers stays the same whatever follows it: due libri, due case.

Cento, mille, mila

Hundreds and thousands are where italian numbers get a small but constant trap.

• cento never changes: cento euro, duecento persone, novecento anni.
• mille becomes mila in the plural: mille (1000), duemila (2000), diecimila (10 000).
• All written as one word: milleduecentottantasei (1286), tremilacinquecento (3500).

So the rule for these italian numbers: cento is invariable, but mille turns into mila the moment it is multiplied: duemila, never “duemille”. Italian also uses a full point for thousands and a comma for decimals: 1.500, 3,50.

Milione, miliardo and di

Big italian numbers behave like nouns, not numerals, so they take a plural and the preposition di before what they count.

• un milione di euro, due milioni di abitanti
  a million euros, two million inhabitants
• un miliardo di stelle, tre miliardi di anni
  a billion stars, three billion years
• But no di when another number follows: un milione trecentomila euro
  one million three hundred thousand euros

So with these italian numbers: milione and miliardo pluralise (milioni, miliardi) and take di before a noun, unless a smaller number sits between them and the noun.

Ordinals: primo to decimo, then -esimo

Ordinal italian numbers (first, second, third) are real adjectives: they agree in gender and number with the noun.

• The first ten are special: primo, secondo, terzo, quarto, quinto, sesto, settimo, ottavo, nono, decimo.
• From eleven on, add -esimo to the cardinal minus its last vowel: undicesimo, ventesimo, centesimo.
• They agree: la prima volta, il terzo piano, le prime due settimane.

Because ordinal italian numbers are adjectives, they change ending like any adjective: primo / prima / primi / prime. The cardinals stayed invariable; the ordinals do not.

Cardinal or ordinal?

English uses ordinals where Italian often uses cardinals. This is a frequent slip with italian numbers.

• Dates use the cardinal, except the first: il primo marzo but il tre marzo, il ventitré aprile.
• Kings and popes use the ordinal: Papa Giovanni Paolo II = secondo, Luigi XIV = quattordicesimo.
• Floors use the ordinal: il terzo piano, al quinto piano.

So with dates the italian numbers are cardinal (only il primo is ordinal), while monarchs, centuries and floors stay ordinal. “The third of May” is il tre maggio, not “il terzo maggio”.

Telling your age

Italian states age with avere (to have), not “to be”, and with the noun anni. This is where most beginners first use italian numbers in a real sentence.

• Quanti anni hai? Ho ventun anni.
  How old are you? I’m twenty-one.
• Mia figlia ha tre anni; mio padre ne ha settantotto.
  My daughter is three; my father is seventy-eight.
• A trentatré anni si è trasferita a Lucca.
  At thirty-three she moved to Lucca.

Note ho ventun anni, not “sono ventuno”. Age is avere + number + anni, and ventuno shortens to ventun before anni. A core, daily use of italian numbers. To ask about someone else you keep the same frame: Quanti anni ha tua madre? To give an approximate age Italian uses the collective forms: è sulla trentina (“she’s in her thirties”), è sui cinquant’anni (“he’s around fifty”). And to say someone has just had a birthday: ha appena compiuto trent’anni, “he has just turned thirty”, with the verb compiere.

Dates, time, prices, phone

The four everyday jobs of italian numbers, each with its own small habit.

• Years: read as one number: il 1998 = millenovecentonovantotto, nel 2024 = nel duemilaventiquattro.
• Time: Sono le sette e un quarto; è l’una e mezza; alle otto meno dieci.
• Prices: comma for decimals: dodici euro e cinquanta (12,50).
• Phone: usually digit by digit, often in pairs: zero tre nove, quarantasette…

Years are spoken as a single long word among italian numbers (millenovecento…), time uses e and meno, prices a comma, phone numbers a digit string. None of it is hard once you have heard each pattern once. A few more everyday habits: the 24-hour clock is normal for timetables (il treno delle diciotto e trenta, the 18:30 train) while conversation uses 1 to 12 with di mattina / di pomeriggio / di sera; for “around” a time Italians say verso le otto; and for decades they use the article plus the year-tens, gli anni Ottanta, “the eighties”. Hearing each of these once in context is enough to lock the pattern.

Collective numbers: un paio, una dozzina

Italian has a set of approximate or grouped italian numbers, all nouns that take di.

• un paio di scarpe = a pair of shoes · una dozzina di uova = a dozen eggs
• una decina di persone = about ten people · un centinaio di euro = about a hundred euros
• un migliaio di anni = about a thousand years · migliaia di turisti = thousands of tourists

These approximate italian numbers (una decina, un centinaio, un migliaio) all take di and a plural, and centinaio/migliaio have irregular plurals centinaia/migliaia. They are how Italians avoid sounding falsely precise: instead of “diciannove persone” you say una ventina di persone when the exact figure does not matter. The pattern scales: una quindicina, una trentina, un’ottantina, un centinaio, qualche migliaio. Reaching for the approximate form in casual speech is itself a small marker of fluency with italian numbers.

Words or figures?

A practical question once you can form italian numbers: when do you write them as words and when as digits? Italian convention is close to English, with two habits worth noting.

• Spelled out, a number is one single word, however long: milleduecentottantasei (1286), tremilacinquecentoquaranta (3540). No spaces inside.
• Small quantities in running text are usually words: ho due fratelli, tre giorni di ferie, una decina di persone.
• Prices, years, addresses, statistics and anything technical stay as figures: 1.500 euro, il 2024, via Mazzini 28, il 73%.

So the rule of thumb for written italian numbers: words for small counts in prose, figures for data, and when you do spell a number it is always one unbroken word. Remember too the punctuation flip: full point for thousands (1.500), comma for decimals (3,50), the opposite of English.

Maths and fractions out loud

You will need spoken italian numbers for simple arithmetic, fractions and “times as much”, at the market, splitting a bill, reading a recipe.

• Operations: più (+), meno (−), per (×), diviso (÷), fa / uguale (=).
  Due più tre fa cinque. Dieci diviso due fa cinque.
• Fractions: un mezzo (½), un terzo (⅓), tre quarti (¾), due quinti (2/5). The denominator is the ordinal: quarto, quinto.
• Percentages: il venti per cento (20%), with the article: è aumentato del dieci per cento.
• Times as much: il doppio (double), il triplo (triple), la metà (half).

Notice that fractions reuse the ordinal italian numbers (un terzo = “a third”, literally the ordinal terzo), and percentages take the article (il dieci per cento). With doppio, triplo and metà you rarely need the raw figure at all.

Common mistakes English speakers make

• No accent on -tré: it is ventitré, trentatré, not ventitre.
• Duemille instead of duemila: mille becomes mila when multiplied.
• Forgetting di: not un milione euro but un milione di euro.
• Using “to be” for age: not sono ventuno but ho ventun anni.
• Ordinal dates: not il terzo maggio but il tre maggio (only il primo is ordinal).

Dialog: at the registry office in Modena

Caterina is at the anagrafe (registry office) in Modena. Listen for the italian numbers: age, date, address, amounts.

One short errand uses italian numbers for age (trentadue anni), a date (il primo marzo del millenovecentonovantadue), an address (ventotto, terzo piano), a price and change (sedici, cinquanta, trentaquattro).

Cheat sheet: numbers at a glance

One table for the italian numbers rules that actually trip people. Keep it open while you do the quiz.

Mini-challenge

Test your understanding

The quiz below drills italian numbers: cardinals, ordinals, the uno and mille traps, age and dates. Take it after the cheat sheet.

§

Frequently asked questions

Seven questions about italian numbers come up in every A1 class. The answers below draw on classroom usage and on the Treccani entry numerali.

Related guides

Three guides next to italian numbers in the basics cluster, plus the institutional reference.

• Italian Quanto: how to ask “how much” and “how many”.
• Italian Adjectives: agreement, because ordinal numbers are adjectives.
• Italian Neuter Plurals: centinaio/centinaia, migliaio/migliaia and friends.
• Treccani: numerali: institutional reference.