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Number to Words
Writing numbers as words is one of those unglamorous tasks that surfaces everywhere: bank checks require the written amount, legal documents spell out figures, invoices prefer words for clarity, ESL exercise sheets need practice numbers, and payment amounts are often verified in letters at the end of an agreement. This tool writes any whole number out in proper English or German, live in your browser, with no server involved.
How to use
- Choose the language — English or Deutsch — with the two buttons.
- Type a whole number in the Number field. The word form appears instantly below.
- For English, tick or untick "British 'and' style" to switch between "one hundred and twenty-three" and "one hundred twenty-three".
- Copy the result directly from the page.
The supported range is every whole number from −999,999,999,999 to 999,999,999,999 — up to twelve significant digits — so it covers bank-amount territory and then some.
English rules at a glance
| Form | Example |
|---|---|
| Ones and teens | one, eleven, nineteen |
| Compound tens | twenty-one, ninety-nine (hyphenated) |
| Hundreds | one hundred and five (British), one hundred five (US) |
| Thousands | one thousand and one, one thousand, one hundred and one |
| Millions | one million, two hundred and thirty-four thousand |
| Negatives | minus five |
| Zero | zero |
The British style inserts "and" after "hundred" and before a trailing number under one hundred, the convention used in UK school texts and most formal writing. The US style omits it. Hyphens connect the compound tens as required by style guides.
German rules at a glance
| Form | Example |
|---|---|
| Ones, teens, and tens | eins, elf, zwanzig, dreißig |
| Compound units | einundzwanzig, neunundneunzig |
| Hundreds | einhundert, einhunderteins |
| Thousands fused | eintausendzweihundert, zweitausendeins |
| Millions and milliards | eine Million, zwei Millionen, eine Milliarde, sieben Milliarden |
| Negatives | minus einundzwanzig |
| Zero | null |
German builds its number words from right to left — the unit comes before the tens ("einundzwanzig" = one-and-twenty) — and fuses hundreds and thousands into a single word. A space is inserted only in front of the large scale words "Million", "Millionen", "Milliarde", and "Milliarden". Note the German rule of "ein" in compounds (eintausend, einundzwanzig) versus "eins" standing alone.
When it matters
- Bank and legal documents: amounts written in words are the canonical form on checks and in contracts, precisely to defeat digit-tampering.
- Localized UI and reports: generating a human-friendly figure for a PDF or an email that reads better than a number alone.
- Teaching and practice: creating number-word exercise material in either language.
- Data representation: spec sheets and APIs that must mirror the written-out value for accessibility or voice.
Why it is accurate
The conversion is performed by a table-driven algorithm: numbers are split into three-digit groups, each group is spelled with the same functions, and the groups are joined by their scale words (thousand, million, billion) with the correct connectors and commas. The German variant additionally applies its unique compound logic — reversed tens ordering, fused hundreds, singular/plural scales, and the "ein"/"eins" distinction. Because there is no lookup table of pre-written strings, every value in range is guaranteed to convert, and every conversion is deterministic.
Why it lives on this site
Like the Roman Numeral Converter next to it, this tool is pure client-side string logic. It has no back end, stores nothing, and works offline — the properties that define every component in the Math category of this site. Paste a figure, read (and if needed verify) the written form, and move on.