How to Count to 10 in Persian (Say Them Out Loud)

The numbers 1 to 10 in Persian

Persian is written in a modified Arabic script and read right to left. Each number below shows the script, a transliteration, and a pronunciation hint.

• 1 یک (yek, yek)
• 2 دو (do, doh)
• 3 سه (se, seh)
• 4 چهار (chahar, chah-HAAR)
• 5 پنج (panj, panj)
• 6 شش (shesh, shesh)
• 7 هفت (haft, haft)
• 8 هشت (hasht, hasht)
• 9 نه (noh, noh)
• 10 ده (dah, dah)

Persian vowels are clean and short, close to Spanish. The a in haft is a flat a as in father but short, and the long a in chahar is closer to an aw.

The two different a sounds

Persian distinguishes a short a from a long a, and the difference is real. The short a, as in haft (seven) and hasht (eight), is a flat, quick a. The long a, written with a specific letter and heard in chahar (four), is rounder and deeper, closer to the vowel in law or caught.

So chahar is not chuh-har with a flat a, it is chah-HAAR with that rounded long vowel on the stressed syllable. English speakers often flatten both into the same sound. Keeping them distinct is one of the clearest markers of good Persian pronunciation, and the numbers are an easy place to practice the contrast.

Ending clusters: panj, haft, hasht

Several Persian numbers end in a consonant cluster: panj (five) ends in nj, haft (seven) in ft, and hasht (eight) in sht. English handles clusters like these well, so they are not hard, but say them cleanly without adding an extra vowel.

Do not turn panj into pan-juh or hasht into hash-tuh. Keep the cluster tight at the end of the syllable. The h at the start of haft, hasht, and noh is a real, breathy h, so pronounce it rather than dropping it the way English sometimes does. These are small details, but they add up to counting that sounds confident and correct.

Common mistakes learners make

English speakers repeat a few errors.

• Merging the two a sounds. Keep the short a in haft distinct from the long a in chahar.
• Adding a vowel to clusters. Say panj and hasht with tight endings, not extra syllables.
• Dropping the h. The h in haft and noh is breathy and pronounced.
• Reading right to left backward. Persian script flows right to left, so read the numbers in that direction.

Fix these and your Persian counting sounds clean and natural.

How to make them stick

The vowel contrast and the script are skills you build by using them, not by reading once. Say each number out loud while looking at its Persian form so the sound and the letters connect.

Count stairs, count coins, say your phone number one digit at a time. The strongest drill is trading numbers with a real speaker or an AI speaking partner that answers back, so you produce the long and short a sounds under a little pressure rather than only recognizing them. Short spoken sessions beat long silent ones, and both the sounds and the script grow familiar within a few days.

Counting past 10

Persian teens have their own words rather than a simple ten-plus-digit pattern. Eleven is yazdah, twelve is davazdah, thirteen is sizdah, and so on, all ending in a form of -dah (ten). Twenty is bist, and from there tens and digits combine with the word va (and).

So the ten words you just learned are the base, and the teens are close variations you can pick up next. Persian numbers stay regular and learnable past ten, which is another reason counting to ten first is such an efficient way into the language, covering prices, times, and phone numbers.