Telling Time in Spanish

What time is it? A common question asked in any language. Telling time in Spanish is what we will do in this section of Simple Spanish phrases.

We have covered a lot of ground so far in this series, from greetings and salutations to asking for help and much more. To start at the beginning of the series click here.

Here we will how to tell the time , knowing how numbers in Spanish and how to pronounce them will really help you in this section.

Telling time in Spanish - background lesson

In Spanish the word for time is actually tiempo, or at least the concept of time. However, el tiempo also means weather, so typically if you were to ask someone about el tiempo, you would more than likely get a weather report.

So the best way to aks what time is it, it to actually ask what hour is it? ¿Qué hora es?

In some regions you would say ¿Qué horas son? The English translation is identical.

The difference between the es and the son has to do with the number it refers to. If the number is one as in one o'clock, then you would us es, but if it is any number other than one you use son. We will dive into how the verb ser (to be) works in a grammar lesson later on.

For proper Spanish pronuncation, see this page here.

This will give you a good idea

The majority of the Spanish speaking world uses the 24 hour clock. If you do use the 12-hour clock then you would indicated what time of day it is, for example, it is was before noon, you would say in the morning - de la mañana, in the afternoon - de la tarde or in the evening or night - de la noche and then if it is in the middle of the night it is -

Telling time in Spanish - AM/PM - Minutes

But as with any time, it is not always the case that your tell somebody the time and it is on the hour, so what happens if it is a few minutes past the hour? or several minutes before the hour?

Minutes are added to the hour by using and - y (ee) for minutes 1 - 30

Minutes are subtracted from the hour by using minus - menos (men-nohs) for 31-59

And then there is also half - media (meh-deeya) and quarters - cuartos (koo-ahr-tohs)

You may also have noticed that when telling time in Spanish the female gender is used. La hora is feminine, and therefore the feminine form is used before the hour as it represents la hora. This is also discussed on the colors in Spanish page, and will be disccused further in the grammar section.

The U.S tells time a little bit differently sometimes, versus the standard time telling "rules" above.

For example, you may hear these sorts of phrases.

Falta means lack of or absense of, so in a sense you are saying it is four minus ten. And the reason faltan is used in the above example is because it refers to more than one number and ten is more than one, similar to the rule of es vs son.

Telling time in Spanish - additional helpful phrases

For more simple Spanish phrases, click here.

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Next in this series is Spanish phrases at the restaurant