時/分/秒

Japanese time-telling is straightforward but requires attention to pronunciation shifts.

1. AM and PM
Add 午前（ごぜん） for AM and 午後（ごご） for PM before the time: 午前九時 (9:00 AM). In everyday speech, people frequently use 朝（あさ - morning） or 夜（よる - night） instead, connected with the particle の (e.g., 夜の八時 instead of 午後八時). Be careful with 12:00! Directly translating '12 PM' to 午後十二時 will actually mean 'midnight' in Japanese, and '12 AM' (午前十二時) means 'noon'. To avoid confusion, it is highly recommended to use 午後零時（ごごれいじ） or 正午（しょうご） for noon, and 午前零時（ごぜんれいじ） or 零時（れいじ） for midnight.

2. The Hour Counter: 時（じ）
Most numbers are regular, but three require special attention:

• 4:00 = よじ (Never しじ or よんじ)
• 7:00 = しちじ (Standard reading, though ななじ is often used in public announcements to avoid confusion with 1:00)
• 9:00 = くじ (Never きゅうじ)

3. The Minute Counter: 分（ふん／ぷん）
This is the most complex due to sound changes:

• 〜ぷん: 1（いっぷん）, 3（さんぷん）, 4（よんぷん - standard, though よんふん is very common in everyday speech）, 6（ろっぷん）, 8（はっぷん - more common）, 10（じゅっぷん／じっぷん）, and 何（なんぷん）.
• 〜ふん: 0（ぜろふん／れいふん）, 2（にふん）, 4（よんふん - very common in everyday speech）, 5（ごふん）, 7（ななふん／しちふん）, 8（はちふん - less common, but also correct）, 9（きゅうふん）.

For compound numbers ending in 1-9, the last digit determines the pronunciation. Multiples of 10 (20, 30, 40, etc.) use the じゅっぷん or じっぷん reading (e.g., 20 minutes is 二十分 - にじゅっぷん). For example, 25 minutes is 二十五分（にじゅうごふん） and 31 minutes is 三十一分（さんじゅういっぷん）.

4. Half Past, Before, and Past the Hour: 半（はん）, 前（まえ）, and 過ぎ（すぎ）
To express 30 minutes past the hour, add 半（はん） after the hour counter: 五時半（ごじはん - 5:30). Note that saying 五時三十分（ごじさんじゅっぷん） is also perfectly acceptable. To express minutes before the hour, use 前（まえ）: 十時五分前（じゅうじごふんまえ - 5 minutes to 10). Similarly, to express minutes past the hour, use 過ぎ（すぎ）: 十時五分過ぎ（じゅうじごふんすぎ - 5 minutes past 10).

5. The Second Counter: 秒（びょう）
Unlike the hour counter, the readings for 4 and 9 are regular here: 4秒 is よんびょう (never しびょう or よびょう), and 9秒 is きゅうびょう (never くびょう). For 7秒, ななびょう is overwhelmingly the standard reading to avoid phonetic confusion with 1秒（いちびょう）. For 0 seconds, use ぜろびょう or れいびょう.

6. The Time Particle: に
To say you do something at a specific time, attach the particle に to the time: 七時に起きます (I wake up at 7:00). Note that relative time words like 今（いま - now）, 今日（きょう - today）, and 明日（あした - tomorrow）do not take the particle に. Additionally, when using these relative time words with AM/PM markers, they must precede the AM/PM marker, connected by the particle の (e.g., 明日の午前九時 - 9:00 AM tomorrow).

7. Asking the Time and Duration
To ask "What time is it now?", use 今、何時ですか（いま、なんじですか）. To ask for the exact minute, you can also ask 何分ですか（なんぷんですか）, and for seconds, 何秒ですか（なんびょうですか）. To ask about duration, use 何時間（なんじかん） for "how many hours". For minutes and seconds, the suffix 間（かん） is optional: you can use 何分（なんぷん） or 何分間（なんぷんかん） for "how many minutes", and 何秒（なんびょう） or 何秒間（なんびょうかん） for "how many seconds".

8. Point in Time vs. Duration
Note that 時（じ） is used for a specific point in time (o'clock), while 時間（じかん） is strictly required for a duration (hours). For example, 一時（いちじ） means "1:00", but 一時間（いちじかん） means "one hour". For minutes and seconds, however, 間（かん） is optional. 分（ふん／ぷん） and 秒（びょう） can be used for both a point in time and a duration. For example, 五分（ごふん） can mean "5 minutes past" or a duration of "5 minutes". Adding 間（かん） explicitly emphasizes duration: 分間（ふんかん／ぷんかん） for "for X minutes" and 秒間（びょうかん） for "for X seconds".

9. From and Until: から and まで
To express a starting and ending time, use the particles から (from) and まで (until). For example, 九時から五時まで（くじからごじまで） means "from 9:00 to 5:00". You can use them together or independently.

10. The 24-Hour Clock
Japan heavily uses the 24-hour clock（二十四時間制 - にじゅうよじかんせい）for train schedules, flights, TV listings, and business. When using the 24-hour clock, simply state the hour up to 24 and drop the words 午前 and 午後. For example, 3:00 PM becomes 十五時（じゅうごじ）and 8:00 PM becomes 二十時（にじゅうじ）.