How do you read 2300 military time?

Military time is an unfamiliar concept to many people and understanding how to interpret this type of time can be tricky. At first glance, 2300 military time might look complicated, but it's actually relatively easy to read. Knowing how to read military time in hours rather than minutes can help when trying to plan tasks and events.

So what is military time, and how do you read 2300 military time? Military time is a system of counting the 24-hour day using a four-digit system. This system starts with 0001 at midnight and goes up in increments of 15 minutes until reaching 2400 at midnight the following day. To convert conventional 12-hour times (such as 1:00 PM) into military time, simply add 12 hours to the normal clock time. The result will be the four-digit system equivalent (1300).

In order to read 2300 military time correctly, you must break apart the four digits in pairs; beginning with the first two digits for hours and then the last two for minutes. We know that anything above 1200 refers to afternoon or evening hours, so looking at the 2300 example above we see that it starts with "23". This means it is 11 PM (remembering you should add 12 hours if converting from 12-hour time). The last two digits "00" make up for minutes — meaning this number represents 11:00 PM specifically.

It's important to remember that when converting from conventional 24-hour times into military standard times that you should use "hours" rather than "minutes" as your base unit. The number "2300" is not technically equal to "11:60 PM" since there are only 60 minutes in an hour - making the equation impossible to be correct.