How do you present numbers in English?
Say the figure correctly first: 2.5 is "two point five", 12% is "twelve per cent", 1/3 is "a third". Then frame it with a phrase such as "The key figure here is …" or "That's up from 2.2 last year". Finally, round it for your listeners ("roughly", "just under") or turn the share into a picture: "in other words, one in four".
- Decimals take "point": 2.5 is "two point five", 2.45 is "two point four five".
- Movement takes "by": "rise by 10 per cent"; the gap between two percentage values is measured in "percentage points".
- Round and place: "roughly 100,000", "just under 14 per cent", "in other words, one in four".
B1 · Presentations · 10 minPresenting Numbers and Data, taught brick by brick.
A structured ten-brick lesson for B1 learners. Hear a key figure in context, learn from a tutor how to say decimals, percentages and fractions aloud, then practise in interactive tasks before a final test. The whole arc takes under ten minutes and nothing requires a signup.
- CEFR levelB1 · Intermediate
- Time to completeAbout 10 minutes
- Number sequenceSay it — frame it — place it
- Bricks10 blocks
01 / 07
How to say a figure aloud in English
Before you can place a figure, you have to be able to say it — and that is exactly where a talk can stall. Decimals take a point in English: 2.5 is "two point five", and 0.75 is "nought point seven five" or "zero point seven five", both of which you will hear at work. After the point you read the digits one by one, so 2.45 is "two point four five" rather than "two point forty-five". Percentages are straightforward: 12% is "twelve per cent". Fractions with one on top take an indefinite article: 1/3 is "a third", 1/4 is "a quarter"; 3/4 is "three quarters". Approximations are made audible with "roughly", "around", "just under" and "just over": "just under 14 per cent" sounds more assured than a figure with three decimal places. Say the important numbers aloud once before you walk into the room.
02 / 07
The comma and the point swap places
The second hurdle is purely typographic and still has consequences. In German you write 2,5 and 1.500; in English those become 2.5 and 1,500. In English the point is the decimal marker and the comma is the thousands separator — exactly the other way round. Miss that and you say "two comma five" instead of "two point five", and German 1.500 turns into the wrong "one point five hundred". English-speaking listeners notice both slips, because they have to convert the figure in their heads. So check your slides before you present: tables exported from German systems simply carry the German separators with them. In international documents you sometimes also see a thin gap instead of a separator, as in 1 500; that is neutral and readable in both worlds. What matters most is that one presentation uses one convention throughout.
03 / 07
Per cent, percentage points — and the preposition by
German has Prozentpunkte too, but in conversation the distinction blurs easily — and in English, confusing the two costs real precision. Per cent describes a share or a relative change: "Sales rose by 10 per cent." Percentage points describe the gap between two percentage values: a margin climbing from 12 per cent to 15 per cent has risen by three percentage points — and by 25 per cent at the same time. Both statements are correct; they simply measure different things. The preposition matters just as much. German "um 10 Prozent steigen" becomes "rise by 10 per cent", not "rise on". When a noun carries the idea instead, you switch to of: "a rise of 10 per cent", "an increase of three percentage points". And you name the starting value with from: "That is up from 2.2 last year." Those three small words — by, of, from — carry your entire number statement.
04 / 07
Framing the figure so it lands
A figure on its own is just a noise. That is why every important number in an English presentation gets a frame of two sentences: one before it that announces, and one after it that places. "The key figure here is 2.5 million" tells the room that the number which matters is arriving now. "What this shows is a stronger second quarter" puts the interpretation in front of the figure, which is especially useful when your listeners are short of time. "That's up from 2.2 last year" supplies the comparison point, without which almost nobody can judge whether 2.5 million is a lot or a little. Highlight only one figure per slide in this way; if everything is important, nothing is. The remaining values stay on the slide as evidence, and you do not have to read them out.
05 / 07
Comparing: twice as many, a threefold increase, half of
Comparisons turn a bare figure into a statement, and English has fixed building blocks for them. You build multiples with as many or as much: "We had twice as many enquiries as in 2023" — as many for countable things, as much for uncountable ones. For three times you take either three times as many or the more sober "a threefold increase"; larger multiples follow the same pattern: four times as many, "a fourfold increase". Shares are built with of: "half of our customers", "a third of the budget", "three quarters of the team". A German reflex lurks here: die Hälfte von becomes "half of", not "the half of" or "half from". And when you set two figures directly side by side, compared with does the job: "2.5 million, compared with 2.2 million last year." One comparison per key figure is enough — more tends to confuse the room rather than convince it.
06 / 07
Rounding and putting figures in perspective
Listeners struggle to hold a figure in their heads while you are already talking on. That is why rounding is part of the courtesy of a presentation. Announce it briefly — "Let me round that: roughly 100,000" — and the room knows you are simplifying on purpose rather than being sloppy. The exact figure stays on the slide and remains available in the appendix. More effective still is translating a percentage into a picture: "To put that in perspective, that is one in four customers" or "In other words, half of the team." That turns 25 or 50 per cent into something people can see. A reference point from your listeners' own working life also helps, such as a monthly budget or the size of a team. Choose exactly one such picture per key figure, and say it more slowly than the rest of the sentence.
07 / 07
Where this lesson ends and the next one begins
This lesson covers the spoken figure: pronunciation, separators, per cent and percentage points, framing phrases, comparisons and rounding. It does not explain the visual the figure sits on. The nouns for axes, lines, bars and segments, together with phrases such as "The blue line represents online sales," belong to Describing Charts and Graphs. The verbs and adverbs for movement — rising, falling, levelling off, sharply or slightly — belong to Describing Trends. And the difference between million and billion, which is a trap of its own for German speakers, is covered in detail in Big Numbers: Million vs Billion; you will find it linked at the foot of this page. In a real presentation all four work together: you introduce the visual, describe the movement, give the key figure and place it. While you are learning, keep them apart.