Numbers are among the very first things you need in a new language — prices, phone numbers, ages, times — and Swedish cardinal numbers (the counting numbers: one, two, three…) are mostly regular and quick to learn. There are just two things that make them more than a memorisation drill. First, a couple of pronunciation traps: fyrtio ("forty") has a silent t, and sju, sjutton, sjuttio all begin with the famously elusive sje-sound. Second, a small piece of grammar: the number "1" is not a fixed word but the gender-agreeing en / ett, the same words as the indefinite article. This page builds the numbers from zero to a million and flags every trap as it comes.
0 to 12
The first stretch is pure vocabulary. Learn these as a block:
| 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| noll | en / ett | två | tre | fyra | fem | sex |
| 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| sju | åtta | nio | tio | elva | tolv |
Two notes already. Sju ("seven") opens with the sje-sound — a soft, breathy hw/sh-like sound with no English equivalent (covered fully on the Sje and Tje Sounds page); do not pronounce it like English "s." And nio ("nine") and tio ("ten") are commonly reduced in speech to nie/ni and tie/ti, though you write the full forms.
Jag har två syskon: en bror och en syster.
I have two siblings: a brother and a sister. två for the count; note 'en' before each noun here is the article, not the number.
13 to 19: the -ton teens
The teens are built on a recognisable base plus the ending -ton:
| 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| tretton | fjorton | femton | sexton | sjutton | arton | nitton |
Watch sjutton ("seventeen") — same sje-sound at the start as sju. And arton ("eighteen") has lost its expected åtta-base entirely; it is simply arton, an irregularity worth memorising.
Min dotter fyller sjutton i mars.
My daughter turns seventeen in March. sjutton — note the sje-sound opening, like sju.
The tens: 20 to 90
The tens are formed with the ending -tio (a reduced form of tio, "ten"), mostly pronounced like a weak "-ti":
| 20 | 30 | 40 | 50 |
|---|---|---|---|
| tjugo | trettio | fyrtio | femtio |
| 60 | 70 | 80 | 90 |
|---|---|---|---|
| sextio | sjuttio | åttio | nittio |
Three traps live in this row:
- fyrtio (40) is written with a t but pronounced "förti" — the t is silent and the vowel is short ö-like, not the y the spelling suggests. This is the single most mispronounced Swedish number.
- sjuttio (70) opens with the sje-sound, like sju and sjutton. So three of your numbers — 7, 17, 70 — all start with that one sound.
- tjugo (20) opens with the tje-sound (a soft "ch"-like sound), not a hard "t."
Han är fyrtio år gammal.
He's forty years old. Spelled fyrtio but said 'förti' — the t is silent.
Bussen går klockan sju och nästa klockan sjuttio… nej, klockan halv åtta.
The bus leaves at seven and the next at seventy… no, at half past seven. Playful, but note sju and sjuttio share the sje-sound.
Compound numbers: 21, 143, …
Swedish builds compound numbers by simply writing them solid, biggest unit first, with no "and" and no hyphens: tens + units, hundreds + tens + units. There is no word och between the parts (unlike English's optional "one hundred and forty-three"):
- 21 = tjugoett (tjugo + ett)
- 35 = trettiofem
- 99 = nittionio
- 143 = hundrafyrtiotre (hundra + fyrtio + tre)
Jag är tjugoett år.
I'm twenty-one years old. tjugo + ett written as one word; note 'ett' because 'år' is a neuter noun (see below).
Det kostar hundrafyrtiotre kronor.
It costs a hundred and forty-three kronor. hundra + fyrtio + tre, all run together as one word, no 'och'.
Hundreds, thousands, millions
| 100 | 1 000 | 1 000 000 |
|---|---|---|
| (ett)hundra | (ett)tusen | en miljon |
You may say hundra and tusen alone, or with a leading ett for emphasis or clarity (etthundra, ettusen). Multiples just prefix the count: tvåhundra (200), femtusen (5 000), två miljoner (note: miljon is a noun, so it takes a plural miljoner and stays a separate word). Larger numbers are spelled solid up to the thousands:
Stadion tar tvåtusenfemhundra åskådare.
The stadium holds two thousand five hundred spectators. tvåtusenfemhundra written solid as one word.
Vinsten var en miljon kronor.
The prize was one million kronor. 'miljon' is a noun — 'en miljon', and 'två miljoner' in the plural.
The gender quirk: '1' is en / ett
Here is the one real piece of grammar in the cardinals. The number "1" is not a fixed word — it is the gender-sensitive en (common gender) / ett (neuter), the very same pair that serves as the indefinite article "a/an." So "one" must agree with the noun it counts, exactly as the article does:
- en bil ("one car / a car") — bil is a common-gender (en-) word
- ett år ("one year / a year") — år is a neuter (ett-) word
Jag har bara en krona kvar.
I only have one krona left. en krona — common gender.
Vi väntade i ett år.
We waited for one year. ett år — neuter; saying 'en år' is a real and common beginner error.
Every other number — två, tre, fyra … — is gender-neutral and never changes. Only "1" agrees. And this agreement carries into compounds: tjugoett ends in ett before a neuter noun (tjugoett år) but the form tjugoen appears before a common-gender noun in careful usage (tjugoen kronor) — though in counting aloud and informally, tjugoett is what most people say. For the underlying gender system, see Grammatical Gender.
Common Mistakes
❌ Han är 'fyr-ti-o' år. (pronouncing the t and full vowel)
Incorrect — fyrtio (40) is pronounced 'förti': the t is silent and the vowel is short, not 'fyr'.
✅ Han är fyrtio år (said 'förti').
He is forty years old — silent t.
❌ Vi väntade i en år.
Incorrect — 'år' is a neuter noun, so 'one year' is ett år, not en år.
✅ Vi väntade i ett år.
We waited for one year.
❌ hundra och fyrtio tre / hundra-fyrtio-tre
Incorrect — Swedish has no 'och' between the parts and no hyphens; write the number solid.
✅ hundrafyrtiotre
One hundred and forty-three — one solid word.
❌ Pronouncing sju (7) like English 'soo' with a plain s.
Incorrect — sju, sjutton and sjuttio all begin with the Swedish sje-sound, not a plain 's'.
✅ sju, sjutton, sjuttio (all with the sje-sound).
Seven, seventeen, seventy.
❌ Jag har en bil och en hus. (for 'one house')
Incorrect — 'hus' is neuter, so 'one house' is ett hus; '1' agrees with gender.
✅ Jag har en bil och ett hus.
I have one car and one house.
Key Takeaways
- Numbers 0–19 are vocabulary; the tens use -tio (trettio, fyrtio, femtio…); compounds are written solid with no och (tjugoett, hundrafyrtiotre).
- fyrtio (40) is pronounced "förti" — the t is silent.
- sju (7), sjutton (17), sjuttio (70) all start with the sje-sound; tjugo (20) starts with the tje-sound.
- The number "1" is the gender-agreeing en / ett — it must match the noun (en bil, ett år), just like the article "a/an." Every other number is invariable.
- hundra and tusen may stand alone or take a leading ett (etthundra); miljon is a noun (en miljon, två miljoner).
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Start learning Swedish→Related Topics
- Ordinal NumbersA2 — How to say 'first, second, third…' in Swedish — the irregular första/andra/tredje, the regular -de/-te pattern from 'fourth' on, the colon abbreviations (1:a, 4:e), and why ordinals always take the definite adjective form (den första gången). Plus the trap that andra means both 'second' AND 'other'.
- Dates and DaysA2 — How to say and write dates, days of the week, months and years in Swedish — lowercase days/months, the den + ordinal date format (den femte maj), reading years (nittonhundraåttiofem), and the tense-bearing day prepositions: på måndag ('next/this Monday') versus i måndags ('last Monday').
- Grammatical Gender: en and ettA1 — Swedish's two-gender system — common-gender en-words (~75%) and neuter ett-words (~25%) — and the honest truth that gender is mostly arbitrary and learned per word. Plus the genuine tendencies that cut the guesswork (unstressed -a is almost always en), and why gender matters: it drives the article, the definite ending, and the -t neuter form on adjectives.
- The sje-ljud and tje-ljudA2 — Swedish's two famous fricatives: the sje-ljud /ɧ/ (sj, skj, stj, sk before a front vowel, -tion) and the tje-ljud /ɕ/ (tj, kj, k before a front vowel). The huge spelling-to-sound spread, the front/back regional split in the sje-sound, and why you should pick one realisation rather than chase 'the' sound.