Live · 24-hour format · conversion chart
Military time clock
The current time in 24-hour format, updating live, with the full conversion chart and the reading conventions below.
How do you convert military time?
For anything before noon the digits are the same, with a leading zero: 9am is 0900. From 1pm onward, add twelve to the hour, so 3pm becomes 1500 and 9pm becomes 2100. Going the other way, subtract twelve from anything above 1200. The conversion chart on this page has every hour laid out if you would rather read it off than calculate it.
Midnight is the case that catches people. The day starts at 0000 and ends at 2359; 2400 is sometimes used to mean the end of a day rather than the start, which is exactly why written schedules tend to avoid it.
Why does the military use 24-hour time?
Because am and pm are one keystroke from a twelve-hour error, and in a written order that ambiguity is expensive. A 24-hour clock has exactly one reading for every moment of the day. The same reasoning is why hospitals, aviation, rail timetables and most of the world outside the US and a handful of other countries use it for anything written down.
How do you say military time out loud?
Hours and minutes as separate numbers, so 1430 is “fourteen thirty”. On the hour, the convention is “hundred”: 1500 is “fifteen hundred”. Leading zeros are spoken as “zero”, making 0700 “zero seven hundred”. Whether the word “hours” follows depends on the service and the country, and nobody will misunderstand you either way.
Frequently asked questions
- How do I read military time?
- Hours run 0000 to 2359. Up to noon it matches the familiar clock (0900 = 9:00 AM). After noon, subtract 12 to get PM time: 1700 - 12 = 5:00 PM. Spoken, 1700 is 'seventeen hundred'.
- Is midnight 0000 or 2400?
- Both are used. 0000 marks the start of a day, 2400 the end of the previous one — the same moment. Most digital systems and this clock use 0000.
- What is the difference between military time and 24-hour time?
- The format is the same. Military usage drops the colon (writes 0930, says 'zero nine thirty'), while civilian 24-hour time writes 09:30. Most of the world outside the US uses 24-hour time daily.
- Why do hospitals and the military use it?
- It removes AM/PM ambiguity. A medication order for '8:00' has two possible meanings; '2000' has one. Any field where a misread time has consequences tends to adopt it.