Thinking of the use of terms such of 'most participants said' 'some said that' etc - not sure whether appropriate in qualitative research? Any thoughts for or against?

Which type of qualitative research are you doing, and how are you presenting your findings? In both the qualitative methods I've used (IPA and critical discursive psychology) it would be ok to use phrases like, 'several participants mentioned X' or 'X was a theme discussed by most of the participants', and these statements would then be followed up with quotes from the transcripts. It might help to look at some published papers that have used whichever approach you're using?

I am advised by my supervisor to use numbers, e.g. several participants (25 out of 45) said that.....

I have used more general phrase (e.g. most, a few) as well as numbers like emmaki did. I also included in table in my paper (Thematic Analysis) on the number of participants who had endorsed each theme/ sub-theme. I see numbers as giving more concrete information.