Hungarian numbers

Hungarian numbers are logical and almost completely regular: once you know the numbers from 1 to 10, the tens and a handful of stem changes, you can build any figure up to a billion. The traps are elsewhere: two words for "two", a spelling rule that switches at 2000, and nouns that stay singular after every number.

Counting from zero to a billion

Zero to twenty

Two details catch the eye. First, tíz becomes tizen- (short i) in 11 to 19, and húsz becomes huszon- (short u) in 21 to 29. Second, when tizen- meets a word starting with n or ny, both letters are written: tizennégy, tizennyolc. Pronounce the n long.

Tens, hundreds, thousands and beyond

From 30 upwards the pattern is transparent: 40 to 90 are the units plus -van/-ven, with vowel harmony choosing the vowel (hatvan but hetven; see vowel harmony). Note the shortened stems: négy gives negyven and hét gives hetven. Only 30 (harminc) is irregular.

Numbers are built from largest to smallest, exactly as in English, but everything is glued together: 1956 is ezerkilencszázötvenhat ("thousand nine-hundred fifty-six"). Plain száz and ezer mean "one hundred" and "one thousand"; the forms egyszáz and egyezer exist but are used mainly where precision matters, for example when writing out an amount in words on a form.

The spelling rule: one word up to 2000, then hyphens

This is the rule that most textbooks skip and most learners get wrong. According to A magyar helyesírás szabályai, the official spelling code:

1. Up to 2000, every number is written as one word, however long: ezerkilencszázkilencvenkilenc (1999), kétezer (2000).
2. Above 2000, if the number consists of more than one group, split it into groups of three digits counted from the right and put a hyphen between the groups: kétezer-egy (2001), háromezer-négyszázötven (3450).
3. Round numbers above 2000 that consist of a single group plus a unit word stay as one word: tízezer, százezer, hárommillió.

The hyphen marks exactly where you would put a space in the figure. In figures, Hungarian separates groups of three with a space (1 000 000); four-digit numbers are usually written without one (2026). A comma is never a thousands separator, because the comma is the decimal mark.

To check your own spellings, type any figure into the number converter, which applies these rules automatically.

Két or kettő?

Hungarian has two words for "two", and the choice is grammatical, not stylistic.

• Két jegyet kérek. Two tickets, please.
• Hány jegyet kér? Kettőt. How many tickets would you like? Two.
• Huszonkét éves vagyok. I'm twenty-two years old.
• Kettőkor találkozunk. We're meeting at two.

Ordinal numbers: first, second, third

Ordinals take -adik / -edik / -odik / -ödik, chosen by vowel harmony. Only "first" and "second" have their own forms, and several stems change.

The important exception to the exception: első and második are used only on their own. In compounds the regular forms return, so 21st is huszonegyedik (never *huszonelső) and 32nd is harminckettedik.

In writing, an ordinal is a numeral followed by a full stop: a 3. emelet (the third floor), a 21. század (the 21st century). Roman numerals are common for centuries and rulers: a XIX. század, I. István (read első István). Because of this full stop, dates such as március 15. are really ordinals; see dates, days and months.

Fractions, halves and decimals

Fractions are the ordinal minus -ik: harmad (third), negyed (quarter), ötöd (fifth), tized (tenth), század (hundredth), ezred (thousandth). A half is fél. Multi-part fractions are written as one word: egyharmad (1/3), kétharmad (2/3), háromnegyed (3/4).

• fél kiló kenyér half a kilo of bread
• másfél óra an hour and a half (másfél = 1.5)
• két és fél hét two and a half weeks
• a lakosság kétharmada two-thirds of the population (possessive -a)
• Megettem a felét. I ate half of it. (fél as a noun: fele)

The same words appear in clock times, where negyed, fél and háromnegyed point forward to the next hour; see telling the time.

Decimals use a comma

Hungarian writes a decimal comma, not a point: 3.5 is 3,5. Read it aloud as "whole" plus a fraction: három egész öt tized, literally "three whole, five tenths".

Note két egész, not *kettő egész: egész behaves like a noun, so the attributive két is used. In casual speech people often drop the fraction word and say just három egész öt.

Nouns stay singular after numbers

After any number, and after quantity words such as sok (many), kevés (few), néhány (some), több (several, more) and hány? (how many?), the noun is singular, and so is the verb.

• Három gyerekem van. I have three children.
• Öt ember várt a buszra. Five people were waiting for the bus.
• Hány könyv van a polcon? How many books are on the shelf?
• Sok turista jön nyáron. Many tourists come in summer.

The logic is that the number already expresses plurality, so marking it again would be redundant. Plural -k appears only without a number: a gyerekek (the children). For the full picture see the plural.

Numbers with suffixes: hármat, háromszor, háromkor

Numbers take case endings like nouns, and several have a special stem before a vowel. The table groups the forms you will use daily.

Stem changes to watch: három becomes hárm- before a vowel (hármat, hárman, hármas), hét shortens to het- (hetet, heten), and ezer drops its second vowel (ezret, ezres). Consonant-initial suffixes such as -szor and -kor attach to the unchanged form: háromszor, hétkor.

• Hányan vagytok? Hárman vagyunk. How many of you are there? There are three of us.
• Hetente kétszer úszom. I swim twice a week.
• A négyes busszal jövök. I'm coming on the number 4 bus.
• Van egy ezresed? Do you have a thousand-forint note?

The -s noun form names the number itself: a school grade (ötöst kaptam, "I got a five", the top mark), a bus or tram line, a room, or a banknote. In writing, a suffix after digits is joined with a hyphen and spelled as pronounced: 3-at, 5-öt, 2-t, 10-szer, 7-kor.

Because the object after a number is indefinite, a verb with a numbered object is in the indefinite conjugation: Veszek három kiflit, not *veszem (see definite and indefinite conjugation and the accusative).

Sources and further reading

• Magyar Tudományos Akadémia, A magyar helyesírás szabályai (12th ed., Akadémiai Kiadó, 2015), rules on writing numerals
• Carol H. Rounds, Hungarian: An Essential Grammar (2nd ed., Routledge, 2009), chapter on numerals
• István Kenesei, Robert M. Vago and Anna Fenyvesi, Hungarian (Descriptive Grammars series, Routledge, 1998)

Frequently asked questions