Put the right sign between two numbers, or write a set of numbers in order. Choose how many digits the numbers have and print with a matching answer key.
Grade 1–Grade 4 · every refresh draws a new set · answer key included
Comparing numbers worksheets
Write <, > or = in each box.
Comparing numbers worksheets — answer key
Write <, > or = in each box.
20 problems · US Letter · answer key — 2 sheets, page breaks marked in the preview
Comparing numbers looks trivial until the numbers get long, and then it stops being about size and starts being about place value: 1,099 and 987 have to be compared by looking at how many digits each has, not at which one starts with the bigger figure. That is exactly where pupils go wrong, so this page draws pairs that share leading digits and pairs with different lengths rather than pairs that can be settled at a glance. Equal pairs turn up occasionally, because a sheet where the answer is never = teaches pupils to stop considering it.
Grade 1 to Grade 4, ages six to ten. Single and two digit numbers suit the first year, three and four digits Grade 2 and 3, and putting four long numbers in order is a Grade 3 to 4 exercise.
The digit count is the whole difficulty here. Keep it at two while the vocabulary of greater and less is being learned, then raise it once the class needs to compare by place rather than by feel. Ordering four numbers is a genuinely different exercise from comparing two: it needs a strategy, not a judgement, and it is worth setting on its own page after the signs are secure.
The famous one is reading the sign backwards — the crocodile eats the bigger number, and half a class remembers which end that is. The more revealing error is comparing digit by digit from the left without checking the lengths first, which makes 987 look bigger than 1,099. When ordering, watch for pupils who sort correctly but write the list largest first: worth a word about reading the instruction rather than a cross.