Numbers by ear

In one line

Numbers are the hardest part of listening, because soixante and soixante-dix are one short syllable apart — and both go past in a single moment.

Seven pairs that blur in the ear

six and dix are the biggest single source of error, because both are one short syllable and only the first consonant differs.

English has its own confusable pairs — thirteen/thirty, fourteen/forty — and your ear is trained for those. The French pairs are entirely different ones, so that training does not help. In particular, French has no stress difference to fall back on: English separates THIRteen from THIRty by stress, and French stresses the last syllable of everything.

Variable pronunciation — one number, three sounds

Five numbers change shape depending on the next word:

So the same six is heard three ways:

neuf ans /nœ.v‿ɑ̃/ and neuf heures /nœ.v‿œʁ/ are the only two places where neuf sounds /v/.

The 24-hour clock

Announcements and news always use it — which brings in the numbers above twelve:

The liaison with heures is the key difficulty: treize heures /tʁɛ.z‿œʁ/ — the /z/ attaches to heures and the word boundary disappears.

English uses the 24-hour clock rarely and reads it digit by digit — "nineteen twenty". French says it as two full numbers with a noun in between, which sounds nothing like the English.

Prices

And decimal prices are said without any word for the decimal point:

quinze euros cinquante = 15,50 € — not quinze virgule cinquante

English does the same — "fifteen fifty" — so this half is familiar. What differs is that the currency word comes in the middle, not at the start: quinze euros cinquante, not "€15.50".

Years

Twentieth-century years are long and take practice to hear. The pattern is mille neuf cent + the last two digits.

English says "nineteen ninety-eight" — two two-digit numbers. French says "one thousand nine hundred ninety-eight" — a full number. The French version is roughly twice as long and shares no structure with the English.

Phone numbers — in pairs

A French number is always read two digits at a time:

06 12 34 56 78 → zéro six · douze · trente-quatre · cinquante-six · soixante-dix-huit

Not digit by digit. So you have to recognise two-digit numbers as single units.

This is the single biggest practical difficulty for an English speaker, because English reads phone numbers digit by digit. A French speaker giving you their number sounds like five rapid two-digit numbers, and if your ear is set for single digits you will lose it in the first second.

Where you hear them

Traps

How to train your ear for numbers