Cardinal Numbers 11-1000 | Croatian Grammar

Once you can count to ten, the rest of Croatian's numbers are built from a small kit of parts that snap together in a fixed order. The teens are a single suffix glued onto the units; the tens are mostly the units plus -deset; hundreds and thousands are their own words. The genuinely hard part is not the vocabulary — it is that the last word of a compound number silently decides what case the counted noun takes. This page builds the numbers; the case logic is previewed here and detailed on numeral government.

The teens: units + -naest

The numbers 11 through 19 are formed by taking the unit and adding -naest (a worn-down form of "on ten"). There are no surprises in the vocabulary, but note the small spelling shifts.

Number	Croatian
11	jedanaest
12	dvanaest
13	trinaest
14	četrnaest
15	petnaest
16	šesnaest
17	sedamnaest
18	osamnaest
19	devetnaest

Watch the two that lose a sound: četiri drops its -i- to give četrnaest (not četirnaest), and šest loses its -t to give šesnaest (not šestnaest). The teens are invariable — you do not decline them in everyday speech.

Imam četrnaest godina.

I'm fourteen years old. — note 'četrnaest', not 'četirnaest'.

Autobus kreće za petnaest minuta.

The bus leaves in fifteen minutes.

U razredu nas je šesnaest.

There are sixteen of us in the class. — 'šesnaest', the -t of šest is gone.

The tens: units + -deset

The tens from 20 to 90 are the unit stem plus -deset ("tens"). Only dvadeset and trideset are slightly irregular in shape; from 40 up they are transparent.

Number	Croatian	Built from
20	dvadeset	dva + deset
30	trideset	tri + deset
40	četrdeset	četr- + deset
50	pedeset	pe- + deset
60	šezdeset	šez- + deset
70	sedamdeset	sedam + deset
80	osamdeset	osam + deset
90	devedeset	deve- + deset

Three spellings catch learners. Četrdeset (40) drops the -i- of četiri, exactly as četrnaest did. Pedeset (50) is not petdeset — the -t assimilates away. And šezdeset (60) is spelled with a z, not an s, because the -t of šest voices the following sound: write šez-, not šes-. These are not optional variants; they are the standard spellings.

Moja baka ima osamdeset godina.

My grandmother is eighty years old.

Do Splita ima šezdeset kilometara.

It's sixty kilometres to Split. — 'šezdeset' with a z.

Knjiga ima četrdeset stranica.

The book has forty pages. — 'četrdeset', the -i- of četiri is dropped.

Hundreds, thousands, and beyond

For 100 the word is sto (also stotina as a noun). The higher hundreds simply prefix the multiplier: dvjesto (200), tristo (300), četiristo (400), petsto (500), and so on. "Thousand" is tisuća — and crucially it is a feminine noun, not a frozen number word, so it counts the following noun in the genitive plural and changes its own shape after 2-4.

Number	Croatian
100	sto (stotina)
200	dvjesto / dvjesta
300	tristo
500	petsto
1 000	tisuća (citation: tisuću)
1 000 000	milijun
1 000 000 000	milijarda

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Standard Croatian says tisuća, not hiljada. You will hear hiljada from older speakers and across the eastern border, but in Croatian schooling, media, and writing it is tisuća. Because it is a feminine noun, "one thousand" is usually just tisuću (its accusative-shaped citation form), and 2-4 thousand is dvije/tri/četiri tisuće, 5+ thousand is pet tisuća.

Na koncertu je bilo oko tisuću ljudi.

There were about a thousand people at the concert. — 'tisuću' + genitive plural 'ljudi'.

Stadion prima dvadeset pet tisuća gledatelja.

The stadium holds twenty-five thousand spectators.

Building compounds

Croatian builds compound numbers by naming the place values from largest to smallest, with no "and" between them. English forces "one hundred and five"; Croatian just stacks: sto pet. You may optionally insert i ("and") before the very last element (sto dvadeset i jedan), but it is never required and is often dropped.

Imam dvadeset jedan stol u skladištu.

I have twenty-one tables in the warehouse. — 'dvadeset jedan', the units come last.

Stan je na adresi broj sto dvadeset tri.

The flat is at number one hundred twenty-three. — 'sto dvadeset tri', no 'and'.

Platili smo tristo pedeset eura.

We paid three hundred fifty euros. — 'tristo pedeset', stacked place values.

The last word decides the noun's form

Here is the single rule that makes Croatian numbers feel alien to English speakers: it is the final element of a compound number that governs the counted noun, no matter how huge the number is. Whatever the last word would do on its own, the whole compound does.

A compound ending in 1 (21, 31, 101, 1 001) treats the noun like jedan does: nominative singular, with jedan agreeing in gender.
A compound ending in 2, 3, or 4 (22, 33, 104) triggers the paucal — the special 2-4 form (dva stola).
A compound ending in 0 or in 5-9 (25, 30, 47, 100) takes the genitive plural (pet stolova).
The teens 11-14 are walled off: they always take the genitive plural, because jedanaest, dvanaest… end in -naest, not in the bare units.

U dvorani je dvadeset jedan student.

There are twenty-one students in the hall. — '...jedan' → singular 'student', not plural!

Na popisu je dvadeset dva imena.

There are twenty-two names on the list. — '...dva' → paucal 'imena'.

Došlo je dvadeset pet gostiju.

Twenty-five guests came. — '...pet' → genitive plural 'gostiju'.

Tečaj traje dvanaest tjedana.

The course lasts twelve weeks. — 'dvanaest' is a teen → genitive plural 'tjedana', NOT the paucal.

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Say the number out loud and listen only to the last word. Sto dvadeset jedan ends in jedan, so the noun is singular: sto dvadeset jedan auto. Sto dvadeset dva ends in dva, so it is the paucal: sto dvadeset dva auta. The hundreds and tens in front never matter — only the tail.

Comparison with English

English has exactly one decision to make with a number: singular for "one," plural for everything else. Croatian has three classes, and unlike English it keys them off the spoken final element rather than the numeric value. That is why "21 students" and "25 students" are grammatically different in Croatian (dvadeset jedan student vs dvadeset pet studenata) even though English treats them identically. There is also no equivalent of the connecting "and": sto pet, never sto i pet in the English sense. Finally, "thousand" is a real declining noun, not a number word, so it behaves like kilogram or boca — something you count — which has no parallel in the English word "thousand."

Common Mistakes

❌ Imam šestnaest godina.

Incorrect — 'šest' loses its -t before -naest: 'šesnaest'.

✅ Imam šesnaest godina.

I'm sixteen years old. — 'šesnaest'.

❌ Do mora ima šesdeset kilometara.

Incorrect — 60 is spelled with a z (voicing assimilation): 'šezdeset'.

✅ Do mora ima šezdeset kilometara.

It's sixty kilometres to the sea. — 'šezdeset'.

❌ Platili smo sto i pet eura.

Incorrect — Croatian doesn't use 'i' the way English needs 'one hundred AND five'.

✅ Platili smo sto pet eura.

We paid one hundred five euros. — just stack the place values.

❌ Dvadeset jedan studenti.

Incorrect — a compound ending in 'jedan' forces the SINGULAR: 'dvadeset jedan student'.

✅ Dvadeset jedan student.

Twenty-one students. — '...jedan' drags the noun back to the singular.

❌ Knjiga ima petdeset stranica.

Incorrect — 50 is 'pedeset', the -t assimilates away.

✅ Knjiga ima pedeset stranica.

The book has fifty pages. — 'pedeset'.

Key Takeaways

Teens = unit + -naest (jedanaest, dvanaest); watch četrnaest and šesnaest.
Tens = unit + -deset; watch the spellings četrdeset, pedeset, šezdeset.
Build compounds largest-first with no "and"; i before the last element is optional.
The last word governs the noun: ...1 → singular, ...2-4 → paucal, ...0/5-9 and the teens 11-14 → genitive plural.
Tisuća ("thousand") is a feminine noun and counts its noun in the genitive plural.

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