This article is about time. After reading this article you can ask, understand and tell what the time, day and date is. You also learn to refer to years and ages. In this article knowledge of numbers in Spanish is neccesary. Read on quickly, no time to waste! ;-)

What time is it?

Below you can find some examples of expressions of time. Note that one o'clock is singular, and the rest plural.

¿Qué hora es?
What time is it?
Es la una.
It's one o'clock.
Son las dos.
It's two o'clock.
Hoy el mercado cierra a las trés de la tarde.
Today the market closes at 3 o'clock in the afternoon.
Te veo a las once de la mañana.
I see you at eleven o'clock in the morning.

A market

A little more detailed with half hours and quarters:

Es la una y media.
It's half past one.
Son las siete menos cuarto.
It's a quarter to seven.

Days of the week

In the table below you can see the days of the week.

lunes Monday
martes Tuesday
miércoles Wednesday
jueves Thursday
viernes Friday
sábado Saturday
domingo Sunday

Some examples:

¿Qué día es hoy?
What days is it today?
Hoy es jueves.
Today is Thursday.
Te lo doy el sábado que viene.
I give it to you next Saturday.

Months

In the table below you can see the months of the year. Note that the names resemble their English equivalents very much:

enero January julio July
febrero February agosto August
marzo March septiembre September
abril April octubre October
mayo May noviembre November
junio June diciembre December

Examples:

En abril, aguas mil.
In April it rains a lot. (free translation)
Por mayo cada día un rayo.
In May every day a ray (of sun).

Dates

In Spanish dates are used in the following way:

¿Qué fecha es hoy?
What is today's date?
Hoy es el veintidos de junio.
Today is June 22.
Estamos a catorce de febrero.
Today is February 14.

Note that formulating with estar no article is used. For the first day of the week both the cardinal and ordinal number can be used:

Hoy es el uno/primero de agosto.
Today is the 1st of August.

Years in dates are used as follows:

Nací el diez de octubre de mil novecientos setenta y ocho.
I was born on October 10 of 1978.

In letters the date is always formulated as follows:

Málaga, 3 de septiembre de 2009

Centuries are formulated as follows:

el siglo veintiuno
the twenty-first century