Chinese Phone Numbers – How to Say Yours

Now you know Chinese numbers from 1-100, the phone number should be easy!

One important thing to note:

When referring to phone numbers the Number One is not spoken as Yì 一
but instead Yāo 幺 is used. The general belief is that One and Seven sound
similar (yi and qi) when spoken quickly, hence the introduction of Yao.

Therefore if the start of your phone number reads 136 you will say:

Yao San Liu, not Yi San Liu.

In English, we have a habit of sometimes grouping numbers together, such as “0

Eight Hundred” for 0800 or “Twenty Two, Treble One, Nine” for 221119.

In Mandarin Chinese, this is not the case.

All individual numbers are spoken making it easy to remember.

Once you know the numbers 0-10 you are good to go. Just remember, Yao, not
Yi!

Let’s practice, take a look at these:

13439191994

To say this number we simply say: Yao, San, Si, San, Jiu, Yao, Jiu, Yao, Jiu,
Jiu, Si

13866889988

If this is your phone number, you are blessed. Why?

Anyway, the number: Yao, San, Ba, Liu, Liu, Ba, Ba, Jiu, Jiu, Ba, Ba

NOTE: In Taiwan, they do not use this practice of changing ‘yi’ to ‘yao’ and
instead just use ‘yi’. Many Taiwanese don’t understand this system and if they do
it’s probably because they’ve spent time in Mainland China.