The confusing ways of telling the time in Thai

The Thai way of telling the time takes a little getting used to, as it's very different from English and other European languages. Thais do use the familiar 24 hour military time system to some extent, for example for official announcements, but in every day life a different and uniquely Thai system is used instead. The easiest way to approach it is to recognise that the Thai clock is divided up into roughly 4 blocks of 6 hours each rather than 2 of 12, and that each of these blocks of time is referred to in a different way.

For telling time between the hours of 1am and 5am, the number of the hour is preceded by the word ตี dtee . This is also the verb "to strike", and its use here comes from the ancient custom of a night watchman striking a drum on the hour throughout the night to reassure village residents of their safety.

From 6am to 11am, the number of the hour is followed by the word โมง mohng ("o'clock") and optionally also เช้า cháo ("morning"). This is where you can see that the day is divided into 4 blocks, as the hours from 7am - 11am can also be referred to using the numbers 1 - 5 followed by โมง เช้า mohng cháo . 9am, for instance, can be either เก้าโมงเช้า gâo mohng cháo ("9 o'clock in the morning") or สามโมงเช้า săam mohng cháo ("3 o'clock in the morning").

The hours between 1pm and 6pm are referred to using the words บ่าย bàai ("early afternoon") and เย็น yen ("late afternoon/early evening"). 1-3pm are always referred to using bàai, 5-6pm using yen . 4pm is borderline between the two time periods and can be referred to using either of them, though it's more common to use yen.

The hours from 7pm to 11pm are referred to using the numbers 1 - 5 followed by the word ทุ่ม tûm.

Midnight is occasionally referred to as หกทุ่ม hòk tûm , but much more common is เที่ยงคืน tîang keun as above.

The number of minutes past the hour are then added on. Thai has no equivalent to the English "quarter to" and "quarter past" (the numbers 15 and 45 are used instead), but for "half past" the word ครึ่ง krêung ("half") can be used.