Polish grammar has…a reputation. Most people say it’s the hardest language in the world. In fact, that’s the reason I even started learning it.

And it’s true! The verb aspects are a pain. Even with numbers, Polish makes it unnecessarily complicated. There are some types of grammatical numbers that you can use, depending on situation and the type of thing you’re talking about. Of course, there are also the infamous case declensions.

But fear not! I’m here to clear it all up. Every type of number you’ll need, when to use them, how to use them. All in one place.

If you want to follow my language learning journey and how I got from zero to this point, don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel, so you get all my tips and experiences earlier!

This guide assumes that you already know what the numbers and their declined forms are, so I can focus on how to use them and when to decline them. I won’t give you a full list, so if you’re lost, Wiktionary has all the declensions.

I also don’t recommend studying directly from this article. Instead, learn the grammar from context, and when you get confused, come back here for a reference.

The Basics…or are they?

Let’s start with the nominative and accusative. The basic, default cases that you use most. Should be simple enough, right?

In many cases, you will be using the default form (nominative) of the number, such as when the thing you are counting is the subject of a sentence. The form of the noun, though, will depend on the number:

1 (jeden): treat jeden like an adjective, and change its ending with the noun.

2–4: use the noun in the plural. Also any number that ends with 2, 3, or 4. Note that dwa becomes dwie with any feminine nouns, but trzy and cztery have no feminine forms.

The Number Takes Over

Before we get any further, I need to explain one phenomenon that I call “the number takes over“.

Normally, when you’re talking about a group of things, the things are the subject of the sentence. The verb works with the things.

Three men walk into a pub.

My two sisters don’t get along.

But in many, many situations in Polish, it works differently. The number becomes the subject of the sentence. It’s treated as the more important part of the phrase, instead of the noun itself. It’s a little bit like the words couple and trio in English, except way more common.

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(en sub/粵字)

Airports in chaos, flights cancelled – will I be able to get to the Polyglot Gathering in Teresin, Poland in time?

(Since I’m posting this, obviously I did…and I arrived half a day earlier! As a result, you also get a glimpse of our local tour to the birthplace of Chopin himself!)

Stay tuned (and TURN ON SUBTITLES) for the multilingual conversations I’ll have with my new friends!

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Get $10 for a language lesson on italki

My teachers:

00:00 What’s different this week?
01:03 Day 11 (Taiwanese / Taigi / Hokkien)
01:50 Polyglot Conference language practice rooms – how do they work?
02:53 Online Language Exchange (UK)
04:38 SECRET TECHNIQUE – Shadowing
07:30 Dubbing – How Squid Game helped me practise Polish
10:13 Plan for the next period

Subtitles in Polish, English, and Cantonese.

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The Cantonese podcast for fans of linguistics, language lovers, and Cantonese learners. This episode with our guest Adam discusses using a foreign language in the foreign country, Hong Kong Chinese prescriptivism, language attitudes, studying linguistics, and language features around the world.

Show notes and links available on the Cantonese page. Transcript below.

This podcast is also available on YouTube. Don’t forget to subscribe!

以:英文需要蓬勃發展!

苗:英文雅言……

以:保護英文唔好死啊!

苗:咩啊,拉丁雅言吖嘛,英文係。

靳:拉丁雅言。

苗:古羅馬人都係講英文㗎!

[jingle]

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