Lesson 2

Japanese Numbers

0 - 9

0 *ゼロ／*zero・れい／rei

1 いち／ichi

2 に／ni

3 さん／san

4 *よん／*yon・し／shi・(**よ／**yo)

5 ご／go

6 ろく／roku

7 *なな／*nana・しち／shichi

8 はち／hachi

9 *きゅう／*kyuu・く／ku

In Lesson 2 we learned numbers from zero to nine in Japanese.

Japanese Numbers/ 0 - 9

= “one” as the smallest unit

*The red numbers in the chart are used for phone numbers.

**The blue number in the chart is used for telling the time 4 o’clock.

“0” as ゼロ／zero in Japanese originates from the English numeric number “zero”. Therefore it’s written in katakana as a loanword.

Giving a telephone number

123 の 456 の 7890 です。

The particle “ の ” is usually placed in between the area code, the local exchange code and the last four digits. Therefore, the phone number 123-456-7890 can be pronounced in Japanese as;

desuno no

ichi ni san no yon go roku no nana hachi kyuu zero

no

Meanwhile, “telephone number” in Japanese is “でんわばんごう”. So when you’d like to state the phone number as a sentence in Japanese as;

denwa bangou

いち に さん の よん ご ろく の なな はち きゅう ゼロ

でんわばんごう は 1 2 3 の 4 5 6 の 7 8 9 0 です。denwa bangou

(The phone number is 123-456-7890.)wa ichi ni san no noyon go roku nana hachi kyuu zero desu

わたし の でんわばんごう ＝ my phone number ＝ phone number of mine

If you’d like to give your phone number, you can simply specify the ownership of the phone number as “my phone number” as “わたしの + でんわばんごう”.

My phone number is 123 - 456 - 7890.

denwa bangouwatashi no

(The phone number of mine is 123 - 456 - 7890.)

わたしの でんわばんごうは 123 の 456 の 7890です。watashi no denwa bangou wa ichi ni san no yon go roku no nana hachi kyuu zero desu

Giving one’s telephone number

watashi no denwa bangou

たかはしさん の でんわばんごう ＝ Mr. Takahashi’s phone number

＝ phone number of Mr. Takahashi

If you’d like to give someone else’s phone number, you can simply switch the ownership of the phone number. Say if you’d like to give Mr. Takahashi’s phone number, replace “my” to “Mr. Takahashi’s” as;

Mr. Takahashi’s phone number is 123 - 456 - 7890.

(The phone number of Mr. Takahashi is 123 - 456 - 7890.)

たかはしさんの でんわばんごうは 123 の 456 の 7890です。takahashi san no denwa bangou wa ichi ni san no yon go roku no nana hachi kyuu zero desu

Asking one’s telephone number

If you’d like to ask that the phone number is correct or not, you can simply convert a sentence to a question form by adding “か” at the end of the sentence.

でんわばんごうは 123 の 456 の 7890ですか。denwa bangou wa ichi ni san no yon go roku no nana hachi kyuu zero desu ka

(Is the phone number 123-456-7890?)

If the number is correct the answer would be “はい”, if it’s not correct the answer would be “いいえ” then you can state the correct number as;

いいえ、 123 の 456 の 0987です。iie, ichi ni san no yon go roku no zero kyuu hachi nana desu

(No, it’s 123-456-0987.)

ka

ha i

i i e

でんわばんごうは なんばん ですか。denwa bangou wa nanban desu ka

What (number) is the phone number?

Meanwhile, if you’d like to find out a phone number you ask with “what number” as “なんばん”. You can simply replace the number part in the question sentence to this “なんばん”: as;nanban

nanban

Then the answer would be;

（でんわばんごうは） 1 2 3 の 4 5 6 の 7 8 9 0 です。

(The phone number is 123-456-7890.)ichi ni san no noyon go roku nana hachi kyuu zerodenwa bangou wa desu

You can ask a person’s phone number by adding its ownership as;

たかはしさんの でんわばんごうは なんばん ですか。takahashi san no denwa bangou wa nanban desu ka

What (number) is Mr. Takahashi’s phone number?