In Mandarin, when is zero, one and two pronounced as “dòng”, “yaō”, “liǎng” instead of “yī”, “èr”, “sān”?

You kinda got it mixed up.

“dòng”, “yaō”, “liǎng” mean 0, 1 and 2, however “yī”, “èr”, “sān” actually stands for 1, 2, and 3.

“dòng”, “yaō”, “liǎng” are special pronunciation in Chinese systems such as the Chinese military, police, firefighting, railway, and aviation. They use the radio communication numeric pronunciation avoid confusion and improve clarity, especially in noisy environments where accurately conveying numbers is critical.

This is somewhat similar to the NATO Phonetic Alphabet used by American police.For example, Bravo stands for B, Kilo stands for K, and so on.

Several Chinese numbers have different pronunciations in radio communication compared to everyday speech. They are:

It’s worth noting that pronouncing 1 as “yāo” is quite common in everyday Mandarin, especially when people are reading out phone numbers, addresses, or license plates.

Leave a Comment