French Numbers: 1 to 100

Your guide to counting to 100 in French.

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When you’re learning French, numbers are one of the basics you simply have to master.

After all, how else will you order 6 croissants, or tell your new boss that you’ll be there at 10 o’clock?

In this article, we’ll teach you how to say the numbers from 1 to 100 in French.

One quick note before we start: while we’ve shared a loose pronunciation guide for some of the French numbers, the reality is that the French language uses different sounds from English, so a written guideline is just that. Join Busuu’s online learning community to practice listening and speaking, numbers included, with the help of native French speakers!

Allons-y!

Prefer an interactive lesson?

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Skip straight to the good stuff. Busuu’s online French course can help you learn and practice your numbers at your own pace. Here’s the good news. From 21 to 69, French numbers follow a fairly predictable pattern along those same lines.

Learn to count French numbers 1 to 100

Rather than try to tackle all 100 numbers at once, let’s start with something simple: the French numbers 1 to 20.

French numbers 1-20

Numeral In French Pronunciation
0 zéro zay-ro
1 un euhn
2 deux deuh
3 trois twah
4 quatre kat
5 cinq sank
6 six sees
7 sept set
8 huit weet
9 neuf nuhf
10 dix dees
11 onze ohnz
12 douze dooz
13 treize trehz
14 quatorze katorz
15 quinze kanz
16 seize sehz
17 dix-sept deez-set
18 dix-huit deez-weet
19 dix-neuf deez-nuhf
20 vingt van

You’ll notice that 11 to 16 in French don’t quite follow a regular pattern just yet, like how we say eleven and twelve in English instead of anything more predictable. However, once you hit 17, things start to follow a pattern. Notice that 17, 18, and 19 are the French for 10-7, 10-8, and 10-9.

The most unique feature of French counting for the next section is that, unlike English numbers and numbers in many other Romance languages, you add an et – French for ‘and’ – in every number ending in 1.

Let’s go up to 69 to see how it works.

French numbers 21-69

Numeral In French
21 vingt et un
22 vingt-deux
23 vingt-trois
24 vingt-quatre
25 vingt-cinq
26 vingt-six
27 vingt-sept
28 vingt-huit
29 vingt-neuf
30 trente
31 trente et un
32 trente-deux
33 trente-trois
34 trente-quatre
35 trente-cinq
36 trente-six
37 trente-sept
38 trente-huit
39 trente-neuf
40 quarante
41 quarante et un
42 quarante-deux
43 quarante-trois
44 quarante-quatre
45 quarante-cinq
46 quarante-six
47 quarante-sept
48 quarante-huit
49 quarante-neuf
50 cinquante
51 cinquante et un
52 cinquante-deux
53 cinquante-trois
54 cinquante-quatre
55 cinquante-cinq
56 cinquante-six
57 cinquante-sept
58 cinquante-huit
59 cinquante-neuf
60 soixante
61 soixante et un
62 soixante-deux
63 soixante-trois
64 soixante-quatre
65 soixante-cinq
66 soixante-six
67 soixante-sept
68 soixante-huit
69 soixante-neuf

Phew! Now you can count from 1 to 69 in French. But, why take a pause here?

Well, as we go into this final stretch, you’ll notice something really interesting about French numbers – things get in some ways more complicated, and in other ways less. From here on out, all of the numbers should look familiar.

See, counting to 100 in French includes doing a little math! Fortunately, once you have it down, it makes remembering the names of the numbers fairly straightforward. Check it out.

French numbers 70 to 100

Numeral In French
70 soixante-dix
71 soixante et onze
72 soixante-douze
73 soixante-treize
74 soixante-quatorze
75 soixante-quinze
76 soixante-seize
77 soixante-dix-sept
78 soixante-dix-huit
79 soixante-dix-neuf
80 quatre-vingt
81 quatre-vingt-un
82 quatre-vingt-deux
83 quatre-vingt-trois
84 quatre-vingt-quatre
85 quatre-vingt-cinq
86 quatre-vingt-six
87 quatre-vingt-sept
88 quatre-vingt-huit
89 qquatre-vingt-neuf
90 quatre-vingt-dix
91 quatre-vingt-onze
92 quatre-vingt-douze
93 quatre-vingt-treize
94 quatre-vingt-quatorze
95 quatre-vingt-quinze
96 quatre-vingt-seize
97 quatre-vingt-dix-sept
98 quatre-vingt-dix-huit
99 quatre-vingt-dix-neuf
100 cent

So, as you can see, 70 becomes soixante-dix, 60-10, 71 is soixante-et-onze, 60-and-11, and so on up to 80.

80 is quatre-vingt, meaning 4-20, which, of course, 80 is 4 20s. 81 is quatre-vingt-un (note, no et for 81!), 90 is quatre-vingt-dix, 4-20-10, and 98 is quatre-vingt-dix-huit – 4-20-10-8. Once you can crack the math side of French counting, the number tells you what it is in simple terms!

Struggling to remember? Try counting something in your house, in your next workout, or in your daily routine en français.

French numbers chart, courtesy of language-learning app Busuu's French numbers guide

Start the countdown to French fluency!

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Level up and begin your journey to fluency by using the French numbers you have learned like “deux” (two) in your daily conversations. Continue learning via Busuu’s free online courses and learning resources!

But wait! What about French ordinal numbers?

Ordinal numbers, like first, second, and third, can be awfully handy. And the good news is, they’re fairly simple to figure out in French.

Other than first, which is premier (m) or première (f), ordinal numbers use the cardinal number (like deux, trois, quatre) plus the suffix –ième, and do not change based on gender. For numbers that end in an e, we drop the e. For cinq and neuf there’s a small change to cinquième and neuvième, and everything else is predictable!

Worth noting: For dates in French, we use premier for the 1st, but otherwise the cardinal numbers only, so you would say deux (2) août, not deuxième (2e) août for August 2nd.

Let’s take a look.

Ordinal number chart

Cardinal Ordinal English abbreviation French abbreviation
un premier, première 1st 1er, 1re
deux deuxième 2nd 2e
trois troisième 3rd 3e
quatre quatrième 4th 4e
cinq cinquième 5th 5e
six sixième 6th 6e
sept septième 7th 7e
huit huitième 8th 8e
neuf neuvième 9th 9e
dix dixième 10th 10e
onze onzième 11th 11e
vingt-trois vingt-troisième 23rd 23e
cinquante cinquantième 50th 50e
cent centième 100th 100e

And now you know your French numbers

And there you have it! French numbers, 1 to 100, covered.

That wasn’t so hard, right? When you set your mind to it, learning to count is as simple as un, deux, trois – that’s 1, 2, 3 in French, as you now know.

Wait! Don’t stop at 100

Practice your numbers and keep learning French with Busuu. You can learn a lot more with bite-sized lessons designed by experts – all it takes is a few minutes a day.