What does a child have to do to compare and order numbers in the 11+?

Order or compare a bounded set of integers or decimals. It is one of 55 named maths skills in the 11+, in the number strand, and this page carries 1 interactive exercise that practises it.

What is the trap in an 11+ compare and order numbers question?

A number written with more digits after the point is not automatically the larger one. The wrong answers on this skill are built out of that, not out of random numbers, so it is worth naming out loud before your child meets it under time pressure.

What can I say if my child is stuck on compare and order numbers?

Point at the next move rather than explaining the whole rule. On a number line the greatest value is always the point furthest right, whatever its digits look like.

What is not part of compare and order numbers in the 11+?

The skill map draws the line here: Excludes rounding. A question past that line is testing a different named maths skill, which is worth knowing before you spend a week practising the wrong one.

Which other 11+ skills should we practise alongside compare and order numbers?

The number strand holds 13 skills that are tested together, and the pages next to compare and order numbers are continue a number sequence, divide whole numbers or decimals and evaluate a mixed expression. Each has its own exercise and its own link, and none of them needs an account.

How can my child practise compare and order numbers for free?

Use Number Line Zoomer, embedded on this page. It is the exercise the skill map attaches to compare and order numbers, it runs in the browser with no account to make, nothing is scored, and nothing a child does here is recorded or sent anywhere. It also has its own link, so you can send it to a child without sending them anywhere else first.

Maths · Number

Compare and order numbers

Order or compare a bounded set of integers or decimals.

Free to use and free to share. There is no sign-up, no score, and nothing a child does here is recorded or sent anywhere.

Practise it now

Zoom into the line and pin the number 3.47 exactly.

This exercise practises compare and order numbers alongside its own main skill, Place Value & Decimals.

Loading the interactive exercise. Nothing you do here is saved or scored.

A worked example

One question of the kind this skill is tested with, worked all the way through: the reasoning, and what the wrong answers are there to catch.

Comparing values on a number line

Points A, D, S and C are marked on the number line. Which of the four values is the greatest?

Each small step is worth 1, and the labelled ticks are 10 apart.

28
12
19
14

Answer: 28

How you get there

A sits furthest right of the four points, which means its value 28 is the greatest; the next one along is 19, so counting digits rather than reading positions is what puts the others first.

Why the other answers tempt

A number written with more digits after the point is not automatically the larger one.

If they are stuck, say this

On a number line the greatest value is always the point furthest right, whatever its digits look like.

Now do it live in Number Line Zoomer

What this exercise is doing

Number Line Zoomer

Zoom into the line and pin the number 3.47 exactly.

This engine’s own main skill is Place Value & Decimals. It practises compare and order numbers alongside it.

Every zoom cuts one gap into ten equal pieces. Between 3 and 4 sit the tenths (3.4), and between 3.4 and 3.5 sit the hundredths (3.47). Decimals never run out - you can always zoom in and split again, which is exactly what each new place-value column means.

What to say if they get stuck

Drag the line left and right to travel. Use + to magnify.
3.47 lives between 3.4 and 3.5 - zoom until you can see the little hundredth ticks in that gap.
From 3.4, count 7 tiny ticks to the right. That is 3.47.

Open Number Line Zoomer on its own page to share it

How compare and order numbers differs from the skills beside it

The same exercise practises several skills, and telling them apart is often the difficulty rather than the exercise itself. On this page the skill is: order or compare a bounded set of integers or decimals, and it stops where excludes rounding.

Locate an equivalent value
Locate a fraction, decimal, or percentage at the same number-line position. One value and one bounded number line.
Read place value
State the value of one digit in an integer or decimal. One specified digit only.

Related maths skills

All maths 11+ skills

Questions parents ask about compare and order numbers

Answered from what the skill map records about this skill, not from a template. Every answer here is on the page, and the same questions are the page's FAQ structured data.

: Order or compare a bounded set of integers or decimals. It is one of 55 named maths skills in the 11+, in the number strand, and this page carries 1 interactive exercise that practises it.
: A number written with more digits after the point is not automatically the larger one. The wrong answers on this skill are built out of that, not out of random numbers, so it is worth naming out loud before your child meets it under time pressure.
: Point at the next move rather than explaining the whole rule. On a number line the greatest value is always the point furthest right, whatever its digits look like.
: The skill map draws the line here: Excludes rounding. A question past that line is testing a different named maths skill, which is worth knowing before you spend a week practising the wrong one.
: The number strand holds 13 skills that are tested together, and the pages next to compare and order numbers are continue a number sequence, divide whole numbers or decimals and evaluate a mixed expression. Each has its own exercise and its own link, and none of them needs an account.
: Use Number Line Zoomer, embedded on this page. It is the exercise the skill map attaches to compare and order numbers, it runs in the browser with no account to make, nothing is scored, and nothing a child does here is recorded or sent anywhere. It also has its own link, so you can send it to a child without sending them anywhere else first.

Knowing which maths topic to practise is most of the work

A free diagnostic covers arithmetic, fractions, geometry, measure and data handling, and comes back with the topics to spend the next few weeks on.

Start the free 11+ diagnostic