Numbers in Taiwanese Hokkien | Complete Guide

Learning how to count in Taiwanese Hokkien is a little trickier than in Mandarin Chinese.

First of all, Taiwanese isn’t as standardized as Mandarin, meaning that some words, including numbers, can be pronounced differently depending on whether you are in the north or south of Taiwan, for example. Here, we will learn the most standardized version, promoted by the central government.

Finally, most numbers have at least two distinct pronunciations: one is “Literary,” based on Classical Chinese pronunciation, and the other is “Colloquial,” native to the Hokkien language. The tricky part here is that there isn’t a specific rule on which pronunciation to use, and people will naturally use a mix of both.

Numbers from 0 to 10 in Taiwanese Hokkien

Let’s start by learning how to count to 10. Note that while there isn’t any strict rule about it, when counting something, the literary pronunciation tends to be used, while the colloquial pronunciation is used when reading a series of numbers.

0 – 零 | 空

零 (Literary): ㄌㄧㄥˊ
空 (Colloquial): ㄎㆲ˪

1 – 一

一 (Literary): ㄧㆵ

一 (Colloquial): ㄐㄧㆵ˙

2 – 二 | 兩

二 (Literary): ㆢㄧ˫

兩 (Colloquial): ㄋㆭ˫

3 – 三

三 (Literary): ㄙㆰ

三 (Colloquial): ㄙㆩ

4 – 四

四 (Literary): ㄙㄨ˪

四 (Colloquial): ㄒㄧ˪

5 – 五

五 (Literary): ㄫㆦˋ

五 (Colloquial): ㆣㆦ˫

6 – 六

六 (Literary): ㄌㄧㆦㆶ˙

六 (Colloquial): ㄌㄚㆶ˙

7 – 七

七 (Literary & Colloquial): ㄑㄧㆵ

8 – 八

八 (Literary): ㄅㄚㆵ

八 (Colloquial): ㄅㆤㆷ

9 – 九

九 (Literary): ㄍㄧㄨˋ

九 (Colloquial): ㄍㄠˋ

10 – 十

十 (Literary): ㄒㄧㆴ˙

十 (Colloquial): ㄗㄚㆴ˙

Numbers from 11 to 19 in Taiwanese Hokkien

The following numbers follows the same logic as in Mandarin: ‘eleven’ is ‘ten + one,’ ‘twelve’ is ‘ten + two,’ etc. However, here you have a mix of colloquial and literary pronunciations without a particular rule; you simply have to memorize it.

	Character	Taiwanese Bopomo
11	十一	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄧㆵ
12	十二	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㆢㄧ˫
13	十三	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄙㆩ
14	十四	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄒㄧ˪
15	十五	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㆣㆦ˫
16	十六	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄌㄚㆶ˙
17	十七	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄑㄧㆵ
18	十八	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄅㆤㆷ
19	十九	ㄗㄚㆴ˙ ㄍㄠˋ

Numbers from 20 to 99 in Taiwanese Hokkien

Again, a logic very similar to that of Mandarin. Find the tens below:

	Character	Taiwanese Bopomo
20	二十	ㆢㄧ˫ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
30	三十	ㄙㆩ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
40	四十	ㄒㄧ˪ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
50	五十	ㄫㆦˋ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
60	六十	ㄌㄚㆶ˙ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
70	七十	ㄑㄧㆵ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
80	八十	ㄅㄚㆵ ㄗㄚㆴ˙
90	九十	ㄍㄠˋ ㄗㄚㆴ˙