Italian numbers sound the way Italian sounds: clean, melodic, almost songlike when you string them together. The first ten are foundational, the teens have a beautiful rhythm, and the combining rule is one of the simplest in any major language — just smush the tens word and the unit word together. By the end of this page, you'll count from zero to a million and your Italian will already sound a level more natural.
What you'll walk away with
- Hear every Italian number spoken by a native voice
- Master the elegant combining rule that builds 21 through 99 with no exceptions
- Walk away ready to read prices, dates, phone numbers, and ages in real Italian
The foundational ten — 0 to 10 in Italian
These eleven words are the building blocks for every Italian number you'll ever say. Tap any to hear it spoken. Spend a minute here — the rest of the article assumes you've heard each of them.
- 0 — zero
- 1 — uno
- 2 — due
- 3 — tre
- 4 — quattro
- 5 — cinque
- 6 — sei
- 7 — sette
- 8 — otto
- 9 — nove
- 10 — dieci
11 to 20 — where Italian shows its character
Some of these are unique words you'll need to memorize; others follow a pattern. Tap any to hear it. Pay attention to the rhythm — the teens often have a distinctive cadence in each language.
- 11 — undici
- 12 — dodici
- 13 — tredici
- 14 — quattordici
- 15 — quindici
- 16 — sedici
- 17 — diciassette
- 18 — diciotto
- 19 — diciannove
- 20 — venti
The tens — 20, 30, 40… up to 100
Once you know these, you can build every two-digit number using the combining rule below. Tap any to hear it.
- 20 — venti
- 30 — trenta
- 40 — quaranta
- 50 — cinquanta
- 60 — sessanta
- 70 — settanta
- 80 — ottanta
- 90 — novanta
- 100 — cento
How to build Italian numbers
Italian smushes the tens word and the unit word together as a single word, dropping the final vowel of the tens word when the unit starts with a vowel. 21 is ventuno (venti + uno → drops the i), 22 is ventidue, 28 is ventotto, 31 is trentuno, 38 is trentotto. The fusion is automatic and predictable. Hundreds work the same way: 123 is centoventitré, 456 is quattrocentocinquantasei. The whole number is written as one word — long, but musical.
Big numbers — 100, 1,000, and 1,000,000
These three words unlock everything from prices to populations to budgets. Tap any to hear it.
- 100 — cento
- 1000 — mille
- 1000000 — milione
The melodic rules of Italian counting
Six insights that take Italian numbers from textbook to natural.
- *The tens drop their final vowel before uno and otto. Venti + uno = ventuno, venti + otto = ventotto. Same for trentuno, trentotto, quarantuno, etc. Other units don't trigger the elision: ventidue, ventitré*.
- *An accent appears on the final é in compounds with tre. Tre alone has no accent, but ventitré, trentatré* do. The accent marks the stressed syllable.
- Italian uses a comma for decimals, like the rest of continental Europe. €12,50 reads as dodici euro e cinquanta centesimi.
- *The number uno agrees with gender like an article. Un libro (a book / one book), una casa (a house / one house). Same in compounds: ventuno libri, ventuna case*.
- Hundreds work without a connector. Duecento (200), trecento (300), cinquecento (500). No "and" needed between hundred and tens: duecentoventi (220), not duecento e venti.
- Years are usually read as full thousands. 1985 is millenovecentoottantacinque — one continuous word for the whole year, said quickly. Mention a famous year (il millenovecentosessantotto — 1968) and you instantly sound more native.
Why Italian numbers reward your effort with a beautiful sound
Italian counting is regular, melodic, and kind to learners. Master the foundational thirty words plus the elision rule, and you can build any number from zero to a million without learning anything new. The system flows musically — and once you say ventotto or trentatré aloud a few times, you'll understand why Italian numbers are widely considered the most beautiful in any language.
Ready to count in real conversations?
Numbers are everywhere — in prices, in addresses, in dates, in directions. Lingden teaches Italian through real sentences with native audio and IPA on every word, so the numbers you just learned become the words people actually use. Free forever for one language. No card required.