Lakh, Crore or Million? The Indian vs International Numbering System

A news report says a company raised “₹500 crore”. An international article calls the same round
“$60 million”. A salary is quoted as “18 LPA”. If you have ever paused to work out what those
actually mean next to each other, you are running into the fact that India counts in a different grouping
system from most of the world.

Neither system is more correct — they simply break long numbers into different chunks. Once you see how the
chunks line up, converting between them takes seconds. (If you want the answer right now, the free
Number to Words converter switches between both systems as you type.)

The core difference: where the commas go

The international system groups digits in threes all the way up: thousand, million, billion,
trillion. The Indian system groups the first three digits, then switches to pairs: thousand, lakh,
crore.

Take the number 12345678:

• International: 12,345,678 — twelve million, three hundred forty-five thousand, six hundred seventy-eight
• Indian: 1,23,45,678 — one crore, twenty-three lakh, forty-five thousand, six hundred seventy-eight

Same number, different punctuation, different names. That is the whole of it.

The conversion table

Four shortcuts worth memorising

You only really need a handful of anchors, and everything else follows:

• 1 million = 10 lakh. So divide millions by 10 to get crore, or multiply by 10 to get lakh.
• 1 crore = 10 million. The most useful single fact in the table.
• 1 billion = 100 crore. Handy for startup funding and government budget figures.
• 1 lakh crore = 1 trillion. This is the scale Union Budget numbers are usually quoted in.

A worked example: a company raises ₹500 crore. Since 1 crore is 10 million, that is 5,000
million — or ₹5 billion. At roughly ₹83 to the dollar, about $60 million. That is how
the two headlines describing the same round line up.

Why India groups digits in pairs

The system is old. Sanskrit texts record names for powers of ten well beyond crore, and terms such as
lakh and crore have been in continuous commercial use across South Asia for centuries — long
before the international short-scale convention of million and billion took hold. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal
and Sri Lanka all still use it.

Because the naming changes every two digits after the first thousand, the comma placement follows the names rather
than the other way round. That is why 1,00,000 looks unusual to an international reader, and why
100,000 looks unusual to an Indian one. Both are simply marking where their own words change.

Where you will actually run into this

• Salaries. “18 LPA” means 18 lakh per annum, which is ₹18,00,000 — about $21,000 at 83 to the dollar.
• Property. Indian listings are quoted in lakh and crore almost universally.
• Startup funding. Indian outlets report crore, international outlets report million, for the identical round.
• Government budgets. Usually in lakh crore, which is trillions.
• Filling forms and cheques. Where you have to write the number out in words, not digits.

Writing these numbers in words

The grouping also changes how a number is spoken. ₹12,34,567 is
“Twelve Lakh Thirty Four Thousand Five Hundred Sixty Seven” in Indian English, but
“One Million Two Hundred Thirty Four Thousand Five Hundred Sixty Seven” internationally.
On an Indian cheque or invoice you should always use the Indian form — see our guide to
writing the amount in words on a cheque for the exact
format banks expect.

Frequently asked questions

Convert it automatically

These free tools handle both systems for you, entirely in your browser:

• Number to Words Converter — switch between lakh/crore and million/billion as you type
• Rupees in Words Converter — Indian cheque and invoice wording
• Unit Converter — length, weight, temperature and more
• Percentage Calculator — every percentage sum, worked out