Time notation PM and AM in English. What is the difference between AM and PM? Fun facts and coincidences

When we talk about time in English, we use abbreviations like AM and PM. What do they mean, and what is the difference between them? In the article we will deal with their use.

AM

Pronunciation and translation:

A.m. / [ee uh] - before noon

Meaning of the word:
Time after midnight and before noon

Use:
Reduction a.m.(from Latin ante meridiem, "before noon") - this interval begins at 12 o'clock at night (midnight) and ends at 12 o'clock in the afternoon (noon). That is, it lasts with 00:00 to 12:00. For example: I woke up at 8 am.

By the way, midnight is usually denoted 12 a.m. , this is, as it were, the beginning of the time interval a.m.

Example:

It's two a.m.
Two o'clock at night. (2:00)

It's ten a.m.
Ten in the morning. (10:00)

PM

Pronunciation and translation:

P.m. / [pee] - after noon

Meaning of the word:
Time from noon to midnight

Use:
Reduction p.m.(from the Latin post meridiem "afternoon") - this interval begins at 12 o'clock in the afternoon (noon) and ends at 12 at night (midnight). That is, it lasts from 12:00 to 00:00. For example: We finished at 10 pm.

By the way, noon, as the beginning of the interval p.m. it is customary to denote 12 p.m.

Example:

It's ten p.m.
Ten p.m. (22:00)

It's five p.m.
Five pm. (17:00)

What is the difference?

We use a.m. when we talk about the interval from 12 o'clock at night (midnight) to 12 o'clock in the afternoon (noon). I.e with 00:00 to 12:00. For example: He arrived at 6 am.

We use p.m. when we talk about the interval from 12 o'clock in the afternoon (noon) to 12 o'clock at night (midnight). I.e from 12:00 to 00:00. For example: We met at 9 pm.

Consolidation exercise

Insert the appropriate abbreviation in the following sentences. Leave your answers in the comments below the article.

1. Meeting at 10 am.
2. She fell asleep at 12 at night.
3. Lunch at 2 pm.
4. It is now 7 am.
5. They will arrive in 3 days.
6. We are leaving at 3 am.

Time: 24-hour and 12-hour. If everything is clear with the distribution of digital indicators in the first case, then the second one is a more complex topic for us. As you know, AM-PM-time are ciphers adopted mainly in America. But few people know that a similar system of calculating hours is also used in Canada, New Zealand, Australia and the Philippines. Therefore, we will consider what it is, so that in the future there will be no confusion.

Difficulties of simple school topics

Surely all children who study English at school come across these ciphers - AM-PM. Time in this case is calculated in numbers from 0 to 12, no more. That is, the first stage takes place before noon, and the second begins after 12 noon, when the next hour is again called the number 1. In order to avoid confusion, the terms AM-PM were introduced. The time in the first half of the day is indicated by the first of them, which means “before noon” in Latin, and the hours that come after are indicated by the second cipher.

Fun facts and coincidences

Many children, going through this topic at school, begin to get confused in these terms. In order for the child to better understand this information, you need to provide him with a simpler analogue of the interpretation of the 12-hour time reckoning. Think carefully, because in our country this system also works at 50%. More often than not, when we make an appointment in the afternoon, we say “9 pm,” although on the 24-hour system it would be 9 pm.

Teach children in simple

Also, the child will better navigate the American time system using standard wall clocks. They do not have digits with an equivalent greater than 12. Therefore, AM-PM time is a system that is much more acceptable for everyday household communication. However, it can create a little confusion when it comes to doing business and scheduling business meetings.

Research excerpts

If we examine the origin of these terms more deeply, then the word merediem is translated from Latin as the middle. That is, it turns out that it can mean both the noon border and the midnight one. Because of this, experts in the field came to the conclusion that the AM-PM time designation can be interchanged, which created even more confusion. As a result, strict rules have been adopted in the United States, according to which midnight is indicated as 11.59 PM, in the event that it refers to the end of the day. And in order to indicate the beginning of a new day, most often they say 12.01 AM. This practice takes place in the jurisdiction and in everyday life.

A small afterword

It is very important that even in school years the child understands this simple topic in English. So it will be easier for him to navigate in space, and in the future there will be no difficulties in work and other areas of life.

You can also explain AM-PM by making duplicate watches with your own hands. There will be nothing special about them except that the letters AM will be located in the center on some, and PM on others. In the morning, put the first hours on the baby’s table so that the brain fixes the “morning-light-AM” pattern. And in the afternoon, be guided by the time shown by the clock with the letters PM.

Not a single day goes by without us looking at the clock, calling or asking the time. In this article, you will learn how to say the time in English, how AM and PM stand for, and what “military time” is.

Basic English words on the topic “Time”

What is AM and PM?

In English, the day is clearly divided into two periods: AM and PM.

AM - 00:00 - 12:00 or from midnight (midnight) to noon (midday);
PM - 12:00 - 00:00 or from noon to midnight.

These abbreviations are not English, but Latin, they stand for ante meridiem(before noon) and post meridiem(afternoon). When naming time, these two abbreviations are often added to make it clear what time of day it is.

An easy way to tell the time in English

In Russian, we can call time simply by two numbers without any "twenty minutes", "half", "a quarter to a minute" and so on. The same way is in English.

03:15 - Three fifteen (three fifteen).
04:35 - Four thirty-five (four thirty-five).

If the exact hour without minutes is specified, then this hour is called + “o’clock”.

11:00 - Eleven o'clock (eleven o'clock).
10:00 - Ten o'clock (ten hours).

In speech, sentences indicating time are built with the formal subject it. According to the rules of grammar, a sentence must have a subject - it formally fulfills this role.

It is five twenty-five AM. - It's five twenty-five in the morning.
It's ten thirty PM. - It's ten thirty at night.

In our country, you can often hear not “six in the evening”, but “eighteen hours”, in America the 24-hour time format is practically not used in everyday life, it is used mainly by police, military, technicians and people of other professions in which accuracy is important. This time designation is called military time- "war time". By the way, how would you say 17:00 in English? Not at all seventeen o'clock or seventeen zero zero. It will be right seventeen hundred Literally, "seventeen hundred".

We call the time in English by the hour

Another, more common, way of saying time is by using expressions like “half-five” instead of “four-thirty,” “a quarter to two” instead of “one forty-five,” etc.

How this is done is shown in detail in the picture:

We call the exact time without tricks: It's...o'clock:

It's ten o'clock. - It's ten o'clock now.
It's four o'clock. - It's four o'clock.

Time with 30 minutes is called with half past(lit.: half after):

It's half past four. - It's half past five.
It's half past one. - It's half past one.

Time with 15 minutes is called with a quarter past(a quarter after) or “a quarter to” (no quarter):

It's a quarter past seven. - It's a quarter past seven.
It's a quarter to nine. “It's a quarter to nine now.

All other time options are indicated using to(without) or past(after).

It's five past seven. - It's five past seven (lit.: five after seven).
It's twenty-five to eleven. - It's twenty to five to eleven now (lit.: twenty-five to eleven).

Other useful words and expressions on the topic "Time"

One of the difficulties associated with the topic of time in English is the correct use of prepositions in different expressions. Mentions of time in conversations are far from being limited to phrases like "It's half past four." For beginners, confusion often arises in the expressions “in an hour” (in an hour), “at nine o’clock” (at nine o’clock), etc.

You can familiarize yourself with the prepositions of time in this collection, and below I give some template expressions that may be useful to you.

I'll come back in ten minutes	I'll be back in 10 minutes
He can fix it within 5 minutes	He can fix it within 5 minutes
We open at seven o'clock	We open at 7 o'clock
What's the time?	What time is it?
It's nine o'clock	(now) 9 o'clock
Can you wait one more second?	Can you wait another second?
What time do you close?	What time do you close?
What are your working hours?	When do you work? (What are your working hours?)
by ten o'clock	by ten o'clock
He always arrives on time.	He always arrives on time
I'm busy at the moment	I am busy at the moment
Meet me in about ten minutes	Meet me in about ten minutes
Give me a call at nine o'clock sharp	Call me at nine o'clock sharp
We don't have much time	We don't have much time
Don't talk during the film	Don't talk during the movie
I like to take a nap in the afternoon	I like to take a nap during the day
Don't walk alone at night	Don't walk alone at night

Hello, dear readers of the blog site. It seems to be a question, but how often does it arise. For example, when working with English-language services, it is always difficult for me to immediately remember what time it is 10.00 PM in terms of our time feeling (do you mean morning or evening?). And in general, where did these AM and PM come from, who needs them and why not use only the 24-hour format?

Well, here is a question, probably from the same area as the use of right-hand traffic in some countries - it just so happened and nothing can be done here. You just need to deal with these a.m.'s once and for all. and p.m. (to get into your head the relationship with the 24-hour ruler), well, or at worst, write yourself a cheat sheet (if, like in my head, nothing lasts for a particularly long time). Where to write? Yes, right here, i.e. on your blog pages. So I will do...

Are we really that far away from the 12 hour time format?

The time format using AM and PM is widespread not only in the bourgeoisie, sometimes its echoes can be observed in the Runet space (mainly in localized bourgeois projects). For example, known to many bloggers, he suggests choosing the time for sending letters to subscribers based on the 12-hour format, and not the 24-hour one:

It seems that the time zone also indicates that here a.m. and p.m. do not understand, and the interface is translated into Russian. No, habit is second nature. And how do I understand 11:00 am - 1:00 pm? Is it from 11 am to 1 pm or from 11 pm to 1 am? You need to google, and so every time, to know for sure ...

Although, I, probably, in vain so attacked the bourgeoisie with their AM and PM. If you think about it, then you and I also half live in a 12-hour world. For example, when they ask you the time, you don’t answer that it’s now fifteen minutes to eighteen, but say that it’s fifteen minutes to six, and in the evenings or mornings - a person is able to determine for himself. In this regard, we are the same.

At the same time, in Russian-language texts, in most cases (yes, always) the 24-hour time scale is used. But here we have an arrow clock, again in a 12-hour format. It would probably be difficult to fit 24 hours there and it would look overloaded.

But our digital clock is again 24-hour, while the Americans have it, judging by the films, 12-hour with a.m. and p.m.

Oh, how everything in life is messed up, if you think about it.

Decoding and nuances of using A.M. and P.M.

But this is all verbiage, and what does AM and PM mean?(how these abbreviations are deciphered). It turns out that these abbreviations are Latin and literally mean the following:

AM - before noon
PM - after noon (this, by the way, is easier to remember, because the first letters in the Russian and Latin names are the same)

This can be quite well illustrated by the following two pointer chronometers:

Then PM is evening and AM is morning. Everything seems to be simple, but there is a small problem. It's all good until it's over before noon or midnight, i.e. rendezvous cycles a.m. and p.m.

In general, it turns out that in different countries that accept a 12-hour cycle, these moments can be celebrated in different ways ( and 12 p.m. and 12 a.m.). Thus, there are discrepancies (such as "the glass is half full or it is half empty"). For me, it would be more logical to use not 12 p.m., but 0 p.m., which would be much more logical, but the bourgeoisie knows better. The result is this, in my opinion, absurdity:

After 12 a.m. goes 01a.m. etc. And after 12p.m. goes 01p.m. I personally have a hard time getting used to it (how can a 1 come after 12?). Americans generally mark midnight in documents as 11:59 p.m., and noon as 12:01 a.m., so that there are no legal incidents and discrepancies. They are kinda weird...

AM and PM to 24 hour conversion table

Well, the full plate of correspondence between 12 and 24-hour time format will then look like this:

Good luck to you! See you soon on the blog pages site

Basic words on the topic "Time"

The basic vocabulary for tenses in English consists of the following words:

o "clock- time
a minute- minute
a half- half
an hour- hour
a quarter- quarter
to- to (in the second half of the hour)
past- after (in the first half of the hour)
sharp (exactly)- exactly (of time)

How to say time in English

In the designation of time in English, several nuances can be distinguished - even time, time in the first and second half of the current hour, and time in minutes that are not multiples of five.

Flat time

The classic option is to use a phrase with the word o "clock.

It's six o "clock - It's exactly 6 o'clock now.

It's eight o "clock - It's exactly 8 o'clock now.

It's ten o "clock - It's exactly 10 o'clock now.

In some cases, the meaning of even time can be reinforced by the word sharp or exactly.

It's two o'clock sharp - It's exactly two o'clock now.

It's exactly seven o'clock - It's exactly seven o'clock now.

Time in the first half of the current hour

Speaking of time after zero minutes in English, constructions with the word past. In this context, it indicates how many minutes have passed since the specified hour.

It "s five past four - 5 minutes past five ("5 minutes after four" literally)

It's ten past two. - 10 minutes after two ("10 minutes after two" literally)

It's twenty past one - 20 minutes past one ("20 minutes past one" literally)

Half and 15 minutes of the hour is a special case. Time in English in such a situation is indicated with the help of words half and a quarter.

For example:

It's half past twelve - Half past one ("half after twelve" literally)

It's a quarter past two - 15 minutes past three ("a quarter after two" literally)

To know how to call time in English correctly, you need to pay attention to the fact that when designating the first half of an hour, the hour that has already come is used!

In addition, in American English you can find a variant with the word after.

It's ten after eight - 10 minutes past eight.

Time in the second half of the current hour

To name the time from half before the new hour, use constructions with the word to. In place of the hour, the time that should come is set.

It's ten to five - Without 10 minutes five (literally "10 minutes to five")

It's five to seven - Five minutes to seven (literally "5 minutes to seven")

It's twenty to four - Twenty minutes to four (literally "20 minutes to four")

A quarter is also used to indicate the last quarter of an hour.

It's a quarter to two - Fifteen minutes to two (literally "15 minutes to two")

In the American version, instead of to meets of.

It's ten of three - Ten to three.

Time in minutes, not a multiple of five

The principle of notation of time in this case is the same, and the grammatical constructions do not change. The only difference is the obligatory use of the word minutes after the numerical designation of minutes.

It's eleven minutes past three - Eleven minutes past three.

It's nineteen minutes to twelve - Nineteen minutes to twelve.

How to ask about the time

To clarify the time in English, the following phrases are used:

What time is it? - What time is it now?

What time is it now? - What time is it now?

What's the time? -What time is it?

Have you got the time? - Do you have a watch?

Could you tell me the time please? - Can you tell me what time it is?

Do you happen to have the time? - Do you happen to know what time it is?

P.M. value and A.M.

Abbreviation p.m. or a.m. near the designation of time plunges some into confusion. So what is time a.m. and p.m. in English and when can such abbreviations be used? P.M. Is it morning or evening? These are the questions that come up most often.

Before answering the question about decoding a.m. and p.m., it is worth remembering that time can be given in both 24-hour and 12-hour formats. In England, only the 12-hour clock is used!

To avoid confusion when naming the time, a.m. is added to the digital value. (am) or p.m. (pm). The designations are translated as follows:

A.M. - ante meridiem("before noon" in Latin, interval from 00:00 to 12:00)

P.M. - post meridiem("afternoon" in Latin, interval from 12:00 to 00:00)

Therefore, answering the question about time in English using the 12 hour format can be done as follows:

It's six p.m. now. - It's 6 pm now.

It's about nine a.m.. - It's about 9 a.m. now.

Even when the answer to the question about the meaning and translation of p.m. and a.m. into English is clarified, there may still be difficulties. First of all, this is a clarification of the transition time. Questions “12 p.m. - how much is this?" and "12 a.m. - how much is this? Is it morning or evening? often require further explanation.

In this case, just remember:

12 p.m. - 12 noon (NOON)!
12 a.m. - 12 o'clock NIGHT (MIDNIGHT)!

If there is no certainty that the designation is remembered correctly, the question about time can be answered:

It's midday | It's noon - It's noon now.

It "s midnight - It's midnight now.

No less popular are designs using in the morning, in the evening, in the afternoon.

It's eight o "clock in the morning - 8 o'clock in the morning.

It's ten o "clock in the evening - 10 pm.

It's three o "clock in the afternoon - 3 o'clock in the afternoon.

Time in PDT and EST

Often in business and scientific documentation you can find two more temporary abbreviations - PDT and EST, since they are used quite often, it is worth clarifying their meaning.

PDT (Pacific Daylight Time)- PDT. It differs from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) by -7 hours, the time difference with Moscow is 11 hours. Operates in the USA. from the second Sunday in March to the first Sunday in November. Thus, if in Moscow it is 18:30, then in the USA at this time it is 7:30 in the morning.

EST (Eastern Standard Time)- North American Eastern Time. This is a time zone that differs from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) by -5 hours and from Moscow time by -8 hours. This belt contains 23 states of the USA, including Connecticut, New York and Florida, three provinces of Canada and 9 countries of the Caribbean, Central and South America. 18:30 Moscow time is 10:30 EST.

Correction of time according to the indicated time zones is often used in international negotiations, tracking international cargo, astronomical observations, and also in other necessary cases.

Useful phrases related to time

For the free use of time notation in English, the following phrases, words and expressions may come in handy:

about - about, approximately (It's about eleven - It's about 11 o'clock now)

almost - almost, practically (It's almost midnight - Almost midnight)

on the dot - exactly (and not a second later) (Meet you at half past nine in the evening on the dot - Meet you at exactly half past ten in the evening).

just gone - the beginning, just arrived, a little more (It's just gone seven. - Now a little more than seven hours)

If it is impossible to answer the question about the time or the wrong answer, the following phrases are used:

My watch is slow. - My clock is slow.

I've left my watch at home. - I forgot my watch at home.

My watch is stolen. - My watch was stolen.

My watch is broken. - My watch is broken.

Your watch is fast. - Your clock is running fast.

I've lost my watch. - I lost my watch.

When naming time and time intervals, certain prepositions are used:

	at eight o'clock
before (such and such hour), by (such and such hour)	by eight o'clock	before 8 o'clock, by 8 o'clock
during	for eight o'clock	within 8 hours
	from eight till ten	from 8 to 10 o'clock
	eight o'clock	after 8 hours
	since eight o'clock
	till eight o'clock	up to 8 hours