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Understand and Tell the Time

3 March 2014 by Marc

clock_12oclock
Twelve o’clock, midday, noon or midnight? All are correct.

Giving the time and understanding it should be easy but because there are a few ways to say the same time it can be difficult.

Use 12-hour clock when speaking

Only the army and people working in transport use 24-hour clock in speech to tell the time.

“It’s one o’clock” is a natural way to give the time.

“It’s thirteen o’clock” is understandable but strange.

Check your minutes

The basic rule is:

__:00 is o’clock;
__:01 to __:30 is past;
and __:31 to __:59 is to.

__:15 is quarter past;
__:30 is half past;
and __:45 is quarter to.

Everything else uses the number of minutes, and don’t use the word ‘minutes’ with ‘past’ or ‘to’ unless you are in a very formal situation or the number of minutes does not end with five or zero.

clock_tenpast6

Ten past six or six ten.

clock_fiveto3

Five to three or two fifty-five.

clock_halfpast6

Half past six or six thirty.

clock_quarterpast2

Quarter past two or two fifteen.

clock_quarterto4

Quarter to four or three forty-five.

You might also find this podcast episode helpful.

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Posted in: Grammar, Situation, Vocabulary Tagged: hours, minutes, o'clock, past, time, to

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