Numbers: the basics

Albanian cardinal numbers are built from a small set of pieces: the numbers 0 through 10, plus rules for combining them into teens, tens, hundreds and thousands. Once you know the pieces and the rules, you can form almost any number.

0 through 10 are direct, memorized forms — there's no pattern to derive them from, they're just words: zero, një (1), dy (2), tre/tri (3), katër (4), pesë (5), gjashtë (6), shtatë (7), tetë (8), nëntë (9), dhjetë (10).

From 11 to 19, numbers follow a pattern: the unit digit plus -mbëdhjetë ("on ten"), e.g. njëmbëdhjetë (11), dymbëdhjetë (12), trembëdhjetë (13), all the way to nëntëmbëdhjetë (19).

Round tens (20, 30, 40…90) are formed by the unit digit plus -dhjetë: tridhjetë (30), pesëdhjetë (50), nëntëdhjetë (90).

Two irregular tens: njëzet (20) and dyzet (40) don't follow the -dhjetë pattern — they're inherited from an older base-twenty counting system. Learn them as exceptions rather than trying to derive them.

To build a number between a ten and the next, join them with e ("and"): njëzet e një (21), tridhjetë e pesë (35).

Hundreds are the unit digit plus -qind: njëqind (100), dyqind (200)… with one small twist — tre (3) keeps its masculine form here rather than shortening: treqind (300), not triqind. Compounds work the same way as with tens: treqind e pesëdhjetë e pesë (355).

Thousands use mijë as a separate word after the unit: një mijë (1,000), dhjetë mijë (10,000). A full compound just chains all the pieces together with e: nëntë mijë e tetëqind e nëntëdhjetë e shtatë (9,897).