Many people get confused with military time. If you are looking for answers to some of the questions like, What is Military Time? How To Tell Military Time? then we have the solution. Read on to find out more about military time.
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What’s military time?
A military day begins at 0 hours and ends at 24 hours. It is based on a 24-hour system of measuring time. In the United States, we typically use a 12-hour clock. At 1:00 p.m., the 12-hour clock resets, but the military clock counts from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m. and beyond. As you can see from the picture, the clock is formatted differently for 24 hours as opposed to 12 hours.
Purpose of military time
Military time is used because it avoids confusion between AM (morning hours) and PM (afternoon hours). We’ve all been there, accidentally setting our alarm for 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:00 a.m., only to be late for an important interview or job.
With military time, we have no confusion because the numbers never repeat. For example, 0700 hours can only mean 7:00 in the morning because military time does not have 7:00 at night. 7:00 p.m. would be 1900 hours.
Military Time Comparisons
When comparing military time to the 12-hour clock most of us are used to, the first 12 hours of a day stay pretty much the same, just written a little differently. For example, 10:00 a.m. (Morning) is written as 1000. Military time does not normally use a colon (:) to separate hours and minutes; they are just written together.
The first two numbers of military time tell you the hour, while the last two numbers tell you the minutes. So if you want to use the 10:35 a.m., you should write 1035 and say ten thirty-five. Some branches of the military use the term hours after hour, saying ten thirty-five hours. Military time always uses four numbers, so fill in the blanks with zeros. For example, 6:00 AM would be written as 0600, not just 600 or 6.
The evening hours are where the biggest changes occur compared to the 12-hour clock. Using the 12-hour clock, we would say the time after noon is 1:00 PM Military time states that this is 1300, or one thousand three hundred. 4:43 in the afternoon would be 1643, which would be sixteen forty-three hours.
Looking at the chart, we can see a comparison of various hours throughout the day.
How to tell military time quickly
So what if you need to quickly convert in your head between the 12-hour clock and military time without looking like a fool? The trick is in number 12 for the afternoon hours. The morning times are easy, they are the same numbers.
So if someone tells you to be at work at 7:30, you know you have to be there at 7:30 in the morning. But, if someone tells you to come in at 1622, all you need to do is subtract 12 from the hours to find out what time they mean. So take the 16 hours and subtract 12 and you get 4, which means they want you to get to work at 4:22 PM. The minutes will remain the same.
You can also use the 12 o’clock trick to convert the 12-hour clock to military time. If you want to tell your friend to come to your house at 9:38 tonight, he just adds 12 to the hours. 9 plus 12 equals 21. This means you want your friend to come at 2138 tonight!
How Do I Set My G Shock To Military Time?
Some more examples to tell military time
Let’s take a closer look at some of these examples of military time versus the original regular time.
12:38 AM = 0038 zero, zero thirty-eight
12:38 PM = 1238 twelve thirty-eight
5:45 a.m. M. = 0545 zero five forty-five
5:45 PM = 1745 seventeen forty-five
7:00 AM = 0700 zero seven hundred
7:00 PM = 1900 thousand nine hundred
When zeros are in front of the hour, as in 0700, the number “zero” is said when telling the time. Sometimes you’ll hear the term ‘oh’ as ’oh seven hundred’, but this is not the formal way of telling time.
Also note that when two zeros follow the hour, such as in 1900, the term “hundred” is used instead of “zero, zero.”
Lesson Summary
Let’s take a few minutes to review what we’ve learned here about military time.
Military time, simply put, is a way of telling time using 24 hours instead of 12. Military time uses four numbers, with the first two showing the hour and the last two showing the minutes, without a colon. Military time starts at 0000 in the morning and counts up, using 1300 for 1:00 PM and 2300 for 11:00 PM.
Use the trick of subtracting 12 from the evening military times for easy conversion to the 12-hour clock. Be careful when saying these times out loud, as 0500 is said, ‘zero five hundred’ and 1318 is said, ‘thirteen eighteen’.
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