Numbers and counting

From 21 on, German says the units first: einundzwanzig is literally "one and twenty". Writing a phone number down as someone dictates it takes practice, because people often read digits in pairs. On the phone you will also hear zwo for zwei, so that it cannot be mistaken for drei.

eins is for counting and for a number standing alone. Before a noun it becomes ein or eine. dreißig is the only ten that ends in -ßig; the others end in -zig. hundert and tausend are written small, but Million is a noun: eine Million, zwei Millionen.

Commas and points swap roles compared with English: 1.500,75 is fifteen hundred point seven five. Ordinals are written with a dot, so "3." reads dritte. erste and dritte are the irregular ones.

Zahl and Nummer are not interchangeable. A Zahl is a number you calculate with. A Nummer identifies something: a phone, a house, a ticket in a queue. anderthalb, built on halb, is a common way to say one and a half.