Is midday 12pm or 12am

The AM PM 12 hour time format can be confusing. When is AM Tuesday?

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Is midday 12pm or 12am

Simple right? When most people say 12pm , typically they're talking about the middle of the day: 12 noon. When they say 12am, they normally mean 12 midnight. While some people follow this convention, technically it's not quite right — as you'll see from the definition of am and pm below. To avoid any confusion and to make sure you arrive on time , it might be best to say 12 noon or 12 midnight instead. Alternatively, you could use the hour clock system, where is noon and or is midnight. Noon is therefore neither 'ante' am nor 'post' pm meridiem. Midnight is also neither am nor pm. This is the Shepherd Gate Clock , which since has been installed outside the gates of the Royal Observatory Greenwich. Notice anything strange?

If all this talk about time has got you in a spin, why not visit the Royal Observatory for yourself?

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Some countries, including the US, Canada, and Australia, use the hour clock format including am and pm. What do these abbreviations mean? Is midnight am or pm? The hour system divides the 24 hours of a day into two periods lasting 12 hours each. The first hour period is designated as am. It runs from midnight to noon.

Is midday 12pm or 12am

We will also see some other useful words and phrases that can crop up when we need to tell the time, or ask what the time is. OK, but what if someone talks about something happening at midnight on Tuesday? Is that 12am or 12pm. Is it the night between Monday and Tuesday or between Tuesday and Wednesday?

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These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. Learn more about time and space with the Royal Observatory Greenwich. Most other languages lack formal abbreviations for "before noon" and "after noon", and their users use the hour clock only orally and informally. There is no genuine confusion nor ambiguity only a self-made one. What do businesses, web sites and software use? We say 12 at midday or midnight as a continuation of the sequence from 1 up to 11, and 12 comes after Retrieved 8 October My bank sent me a message this week asking me to pay in funds by 12pm on 12th June to avoid charges. Retrieved 26 October Hidden categories: Pages containing links to subscription-only content CS1 Spanish-language sources es CS1 uses Japanese-language script ja CS1 Japanese-language sources ja Articles with short description Short description is different from Wikidata Use American English from January All Wikipedia articles written in American English Use dmy dates from November Articles containing Latin-language text All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from January Articles containing Greek-language text Articles containing Sinhala-language text Articles with unsourced statements from December Articles with unsourced statements from October Articles with unsourced statements from March Articles with unsourced statements from November Articles needing additional references from October All articles needing additional references Articles containing Japanese-language text. Noon and midnight are for a infinitely small period of time as is any number on the clock represents. There are no standards established for the meaning of 12am and 12pm. Noon is PM.

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As the day begins at midnight, midnight must be 12am. Gary Reid, Wollongong Australia Midnight is neither 12pm or 12am, there is no such time. In this article we explain all. There is no genuine confusion nor ambiguity only a self-made one. No, none. Web sites, computer systems, timetables all need to be percent accurate and have no ambiguity. What do businesses, web sites and software use? Associated Press style [30]. In the UK, the National Physical Laboratory "FAQ-Time" web page [29] states "In cases where the context cannot be relied upon to place a particular event, the pair of days straddling midnight can be quoted"; also "the terms 12 a. The use of noon and midnight informally or 12 noon and 12 midnight or and should become practice. Retrieved 13 June However, noon is rarely abbreviated in either of these languages, noon normally being written in full. The meridiem is an imaginary semicircle that crosses the sky from due north to due south at your local noon. Retrieved 24 May In reality midnight has no sooner been reached than it has been passed.