Several parts combine into one character.

Pictograph: animal footprints (the upper element) imprinted on a field (田) below. The encoded meaning: "tracks left in sequence" → "turn / order / sequence number". Identical across 繁體 / 新字体 / 简体.

番 functions as both an ordinal counter ("turn N") AND a noun "turn / sequence". It appears constantly in everyday CJK vocabulary.

Mandarin: fān, level 1st tone. 番 in modern Mandarin has shifted somewhat — it tends to mean "(coming from) foreign / barbarian" in older compounds: 番茄 (fānqié, tomato — "foreign eggplant"), 番邦 (fānbāng, foreign country, archaic). For "turn / time", Mandarin prefers 次 (cì): 一次 (yī cì, once). However 一番 (yīfān) survives meaning "a thoroughgoing / a stretch": 一番功夫 = "considerable effort". Also 番号 (fānhào, number — military / serial).

Japanese: on-reading バン (ban) is dominant and extremely high-frequency — 一番 (ichiban, "the first / number one / the most" — one of the most-used Japanese words: 一番好き = "I like X most"), 番号 (bangō, number), 当番 (tōban, on-duty turn), 順番 (junban, order / sequence), 留守番 (rusuban, house-sitter / answering machine — "keeping watch while away"), 交番 (kōban, neighborhood police box — "alternating posts", a Japanese institutional institution), 番組 (bangumi, TV/radio program — "program turn").

一番 (ichiban) is among the all-time most useful Japanese words for learners — meaning "the most" or "number one", it functions both as superlative ("the most beautiful": 一番美しい) and as ordinal ("first / #1"). 交番 (kōban, the small police kiosks scattered throughout Japanese neighborhoods) is a Japanese cultural institution worth knowing — they're where lost tourists ask for directions.

Memory aid: footprints in a field — sequential tracks → "turn" / "number".