Times

How to write and format times.

Use the 12-hour clock

When writing times, use the 12-hour clock and include ‘am’ or ‘pm’ (without spaces or full stops between the letters).

Separate hours and minutes with a colon.

Do not use the 24-hour clock.

Use ‘midday’ instead of 12pm or ‘noon’.

Examples

10am

2:30pm

3pm to 5pm

9am to midday 

Periods of time

Write out fractions of hours in full.

Write:

half an hour

one and a half hours

one and three-quarter hours

Do not write:

0.5 hours or 1.5 hours

1 ½ or 1 ¾ hours

If you're using a time period as an adjective, use hyphens.

Examples

a half-hour wait

There was an hour-and-a-half wait to see the doctor.

International times

When writing for an international audience, specify the time zone in brackets after the time. Refer to ‘UK time’ rather than ‘GMT’ or ‘BST’.

Example

The webinar will begin at 3pm (UK time).

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