Do you read analog clocks to the exact minute? How do you do this quickly?

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨dingus@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨nostupidquestions@lemmy.world⁩

Hello all. I’ve always been a digital clock user, but I am trying to get myself used to reading an analog watch.

For the most part it’s fine, taking me several extra seconds over digital so far.

But one thing I am struggling with is discerning the exact minute. Because the minute hand slowly moves over time as opposed to ticking, I have trouble telling whether or not it’s say…9:22 or 9:23 for example.

Because when the time is say…9:22 and 5 seconds, the hand will clearly be on the 9:22 mark. But when it’s 9:22 and 45 seconds, it looks like it’s actually 9:23 when it isn’t yet.

Is this just always a limitation that I’m stuck with using analog? How precise are you all with analog clocks? Is there a way I can more quickly determine the exact minute?

Thanks!

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AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I used to read analog clocks to the nearest five minutes. It’s just a quick glance and you (used to) rarely need to be that exact.

However my kids never got used to analog clocks despite an annoying number scattered throughout our house. It takes them too long to process what I mean by “quarter of”. They’re in college this year so it’s time to surrender in that battle. Now I’m the one who spends too much time reading analog clocks, trying to read them to nearest minute.

With digital clocks everywhere, gps exact trip times, scheduled meetings, society has gotten much more exact with time anyway. Being within five minutes is no longer good enough

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Deestan@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I grew up with analog clocks and can read them at a glance.

For the most part, I don’t really care precisely about minute. E.g. the analog clock in my kitchen is only used to tell me that it’s “roughly 2 minutes past 5 soon” and it’s enough for me to put the potatoes on.

If I need to know precisely whether it’s 16:03 vs 16:04, I use a digital clock. Though mostly because my analog clocks are not precisely synced at all times.

Back when analog was the norm, nobody cared about a minute here or there unless they had some specific profession. Like, the bus came “15:15 ish maybe 5 minutes early maybe 10 minutes late”. Today the schedule says “15:17”

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- Cevilia@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  
  Today in the digital age, the bus schedule says “15:17”
  
  And the bus might show up about twenty past three, if you’re lucky
  
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- dingus@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  
  Today in the digital age, the bus schedule says “15:17”
  
  Yeah essentially lol. That’s one of the reasons I had never been super into analog clocks beforehand.
  
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yesman@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I think of analog time as kinda a pie chart telling me how much of the minute and hour that’s elapsed. So I don’t see 13:45, I see 75% past one o’clock.

Does that make sense?

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- fitjazz@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  This is why I hate when people ask me what time it is. I can glance at my watch and know what time it is but not in a format that makes sense to other people. In order to tell someone what time it is I have convert to a “normal” format and that makes it look like I cannot quickly read my own watch.
  
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  - ooo@sh.itjust.works ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    That’s when you reply “TIME FOR A NEW WATCH” and give them a shit-eating grin until they leave.
    
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IcedRaktajino@startrek.website ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
If I need that level of precision, I’ll use a digital clock or set an alarm.

I can usually tell within 1-2 minutes which is precise enough for 99.999% of cases. Most IRL scheduling has a lower bound of 5-minute increments, so looking at an analog clock for the exact minute isn’t really necessary.

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ThrowawayPermanente@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
If I’m bored, sure. Otherwise it’s to the nearest 5 minutes

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Randelung@lemmy.world ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The concept of numbers doesn’t come up. The way the hands are conveys the fraction of the hour or half day that has passed. There’s never a need to know the exact number, time is continuous and not discrete. The minute hand will move fractional minutes, too.

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lemmy_outta_here@lemmy.world ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
GenX here. I wanted to reassure you that it didn’t come naturally to me and i grew up when this was still taught in school. The real answer is practice. Read a clock several times a day for a few weeks. Take a moment to think about the mintue hand. Is it about 2/5 of the way to the next digit? 3/5? After a while, you won’t have to think. You will just recognize.

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oeuf@slrpnk.net ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
You’ll just get used to it over time. Think of it as spatial rather than numeric.

It’s actually easier on the brain in my opinion.

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- zipsglacier@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Yep. If it’s 9:22:45, then rounding to 9:23 is more accurate than 9:22 anyway.
  
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zxqwas@lemmy.world ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I usually round to 5 minutes. If I for whatever reason need the exact minute it will take a couple of second to see, depending on the design of the clock.

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- MrQuallzin@lemmy.world ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  This is the way
  
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Mediocre_Bard@lemmy.world ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I … look at them. There is no actual thinking that occurs. If it is 9:22 then it is 9:22. If it is 9:23 then it is 9:23. I understand your question, but if the trailing side of the minute hand is not yet even with or past the plane of the upcoming minute, then it remains the previous minute.

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- dingus@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Maybe my vision just isn’t good enough, but the individual ticks for the minute hand are so small that I have difficulty without holding the watch closer to my face and studying it for a moment if it’s close to the next minute but not there yet. I don’t have old eyes either lol. It’s just small. Maybe a wall clock would be easier to see quickly.
  
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  - lime@feddit.nu ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    the hands tell the time, not the ticks. if you know what way is up, then the angle is all you need.
    
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- laranis@lemmy.zip ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Maybe to help the OP I’ll add a bit to your answer. The entire face of an analog clock is divided into fractional sections. Sounds like you’re really good at parsing those fractions, likely due to lots of practice.
  
  So, big hand after the nine and before the ten? Between :45 and :50. First half of that? Between :46 and :47. More toward the beginning of the split? :46
  
  Maybe OP hasn’t had as much practice so has to think about what 9 is in minutes? Nothing but practice would help get over that, I guess.
  
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Steve@communick.news ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
You might look into getting a slow watch.
It doesn’t really matter exactly what minute it is mostly.

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- dingus@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  That’s a super interesting concept! Neat idea, but I don’t think I’d be able to handle that for when I’m getting ready for work in the morning and the minutes count lol.
  
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- neidu3@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  One reason why I always preferred analog clocks is because they’re faster to parse. Thank you for teaching me about something even faster.
  
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- clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  Hey I like that a lot. Thank you - maybe I’ll become a watch guy after all.
  
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CobblerScholar@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Imo for most applications that I’d be using an analog clock for a time difference of even up to 5-10 minutes is irrelevant. If I really needed up to the minute accuracy I’m using a digital clock with the seconds counting down

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FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Well this is certainly a question I never thought I’d read on the internet.

The school systems need an overhaul.

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- dingus@lemmy.world ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  This isn’t a problem with “the school system”. I know how to read an analog clock. But it’s not something I have ever done daily and so I have never been in practice with it.
  
  Many of the comments here seem to be confused, instead simply instructing me how to read an analog clock in general.
  
  That wasn’t the question or my issue. On a wristwatch, the space between the numbers of the minute hand is pretty small. I am not elderly, but it is difficult for me to see quickly precisely at what tick mark the minute hand is at… especially if it is getting to be toward the next minute and I don’t realize.
  
  One user suggested to briefly also glance at the second hand when I need more precision, which seems to help alleviate part of the problem that I describe.
  
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DarkAri@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I break it into quarters first 12-3, 3-6, 6-9, 9-12. I break it into thirds next, this gets the hour.

Then for minutes i do the same and just do quick caculations in my head,

1/3 of a quarter before 6 is 25 minutes, 1/3 of a quarter after 9 is 50 minutes.

The only thing im really remembering is that values at the quarters,

(12/0 hours - 0 min), 3 hr - 15 min, (6 hr - 30 min), 9 hr - 45 minutes.

After a while it becomes second nature. I learned this when i was a kid because digital clocks werent as common then.

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StrawberryPigtails@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I don’t generally read them to the minute very often. For the most part, 5 min increments are close enough for what I need, most of the time. If I do need a more precise time, I’m usually already closely watching the clock and it’s just addition (was 1341 when I started this, now it’s 1345.).

If I need to get the precise time, cold, than it’s as simple as: closest 5 min tick, then add or subtract minute ticks till you get to the minute hand

Eventually you get to the point where it’s not something you consciously think about. You just look at the clock and then pattern recognition takes over and you just know what time it is.

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palordrolap@fedia.io ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Eventually you learn to recognise the hand positions almost like they're symbols in their own right. You can tell the difference between an apostrophe and a comma, right? And in certain typefaces they're identical symbols other than their position.

For the same reason, you can tell the difference between an hour hand just past the 12 and an hour hand just past the 6. Then you learn what the other positions look like.

Then you can read the minute hand to whatever precision you need.

After that it's just practise, practise, practise. Your read times will tumble and before long you'll be completely used to it and be just as fast as with digital.

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Pacattack57@lemmy.world ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I guess I’m at that age where stuff like this means I’m old 😂

I’ll answer your question though: just buy a watch that the minutes are clearly marked with ticks and the minute hand moves by the minute and isn’t in constant motion.

Here’s some friendly advice though. Before digital, there really wasn’t a way to be so accurate down to the minute. Remember there wasn’t even really a way to get the right time. You just got it from somewhere else and hoped that time was accurate.

With that said, anyone that needed pinpoint accuracy had other means of getting the time or they used very expensive chronometers that kept time extremely well. In other words normal people just did stuff a couple minutes early in case their watches were slow.

ALL OF THAT to say if you want accuracy down to the minute, just use digital.

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actionjbone@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
It takes time to get used to it, no pun intended. Everything is easier with practice.

Those of us who grew up with analog clocks can read them at a glance. If you are new to them, it’ll probably take you a few months (or more) of daily use before you can tell time at a glance.

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hddsx@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
There are usually ticks for every five minutes, most clocks have ticks for each minute. It won’t officially become the next minute until the second hand hits 12.

If you get used to looking at analog clock with minute ticks, you start to get a sense of spacing. If you subdivide the interval of a clock with only five minute ticks, you know what time it is.

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BCsven@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Growing up with only Analog, it just was a quick glance. You didn’t even have to stop and read it, because you glance and have a mental image of the hand positions that you could compare in your head.

Does your watch have clearly marked minutes and a second hand? If its not quite at the minute mark you know its before 9:23, but if its so close you can’t tell then the seconds hand will show you if its before or after the 60seconds spot.

But also, that’s how Analog is, and unless you have a very precise watch, a regular watch will gain or lose time daily and so the preciseness of 9:23 will be invalid anyway.

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- dingus@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  It does have a second hand, but I don’t really look at it much to tell the time.
  
  It’s not that I can’t tell the minutes when it is between numbers, it’s that it will already look like it’s 9:23 because the minute hand has effectively nearly covered the 9:23 minute mark despite it being 9:22. Seems to be a limitation of analog clocks unless I am just not great at discerning these things.
  
  Tbh it’s actually a smartwatch and not technically an actual analog watch, so I’m assuming the exact time is pretty accurate. I just want to start using analog watch faces more on it to make it look nicer haha.
  
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  - lovely_reader@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    It’s not a limitation but a matter of precision. The position of the minute hand tells you how far into that minute you are. You don’t need that information, of course. You can just say whatever mark it’s closest to. At 1:00:58, although a digital clock would still read 1:00, it is by all accounts much more accurate to round the minute to 1:01.
    
    So if you just call the time by the minute your minute hand appears closest to, you’ll often be more accurate than a digital clock. It won’t matter. But you’ll know it’s true.
    
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  - Acamon@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    For you, what’s the value in reading the exact minute? (genuine question, not snark!) In your example it looks like it’s 9:23 but it’s actually 9:22:45… Is that a problem? Probably by the time you do anything with that information fifteen seconds will have passed and it will be 9:23.
    
    For most people, I think analogue is more of vibes way of telling time. You don’t need to know that it’s 7:47 you just glance and see it’s almost ten to eight, and you have to leave soon. I find that I’m basically translating digital time into those approximation anyway. If you like that kinda vagueness and have an android watch then I’d recommend Twelveish as a watch face.
    
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  - a_wild_mimic_appears@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    There are analog clocks that move the minute hand only when the next minute starts. But to be honest, you might profit from a little less rigidity in your “time usage” - it’s good for your mental health to not plan everything down to the minute. If i make a private appointment, i try to set time windows of 10-15 minutes for meetups; i aim for the beginning of the window, and if i get delayed it’s of no consequence.
    
    Can you imagine that it’s not so long ago that people called a phone number that told you what time it will be at the next signal tone?
    
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  - BCsven@lemmy.ca ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    If its a smart display of analog it could be the hand positions have preprogrammed locations and not that is an accurate and smooth transition between the actual progression.
    
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  - hddsx@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    Did you know digital clocks experience drift? Your computer can’t keep accurate track of time, it generally uses the NTP to synchronize time.
    
    Your smart watch either has access to the internet and or syncs to your phone time.
    
    Your analog clock displayed on a digital smart watch also make have inaccuracies due to the processor and the load on it, the refresh rate of the screen, etc.
    
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DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Its six – five = (approx) 06:25:00 (notice minute hand is pointing at 5)

its seven – eight’n’half = (approx) 07:42:05 (minute hand pointing between 8 and 9)

I just do quick maths, I have multiplication table memorized from all the way to 9, since first grade.

They literally make a “poem” on multiplication table in mainland China where I was from (all the way to 9x9, but multiples of 10 is obvious so they ommitted it, afiak).

So my thought process is:
一五的五 (1, 5 = 5)
二五一十 (2, 5, 10)
三五十五 (3, 5, 15)
四五二十 (4, 5, 20)
五五二十五 (5, 5, 25)
五六三十 (5, 6, 30)
五七三十五 (5, 7, 35)
五八四十 (5, 8, 40)
五九四十五 (5, 9, 45)
(this is the point where my thoughts switch away from mandarin and just thinking pure numbers)
5 x 10 = 50
5 x 11 = 55
5 x 12 = wait… no need, its just 0 mins again

So yea just remember how to recall the “poem” out of thin air and summon the numbers, takes about like 1-2 seconds, mandarin being 1 sylable per charater make it easier to remember (七七四十九 – 5 sylables vs “Seven times seven is fourty nine” – 9 sylables). Sorry I don’t know how everyone else do multiplication tables, my brain works differently, but funny thing is, 11x11 to 14x14 really messed with my brain since it only goes to 9x9

(Yes I typed all that just to show off how they literally crammed a weird entire multiplication “poem” in my head that’s still stuck in my head to this day when I’m no longer in the country lolz. Sorry for the boring wall of text xD)

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Apepollo11@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Fun fact - I was 23 and studying for my MSc before I learned how to read analogue clocks.

If you’re after speed, all I can suggest is that you’ve got to embrace the old-people habit of using the nearest 5 minute mark and accept that level of accuracy.

“Quarter past”

“It’s just gone quarter-past”

“It’s nearly twenty-past”

“Twenty past”
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ieatpwns@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I wear an analog with a blank face so I just round to the latest 5 minute increment. But if I need the exact time I just check my phone or another clock/watch with a numbered face

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ooo@sh.itjust.works ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
My primary wall clock has a second hand and clearly defined minute tick marks, and syncs nightly to public timekeeping signals (the so-called “atomic” clock). This satisfies my precision needs.

If your watch doesn’t have a second hand you may want one that does. If you see the minute hand at 9:23 but the second hand it at 45 seconds, then you know it is 9:22:45. It does take an extra glance, but only when you need that exact time.

However, that also depends on being synced to “real” time for it to matter. Therefore most analog watches will always be a little off. Over time (no pun intended) you would learn what the “drift” of the watch is.

To ensure you are on time and you only had an analog watch, you would just be early to ensure you are not late.

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foggy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Step one: where is hour hand? Is it on a number or after? Is it approaching a new number? This is already enough to estimate.

Step two: where is minute hand? Is it on a number, or after? Is it approaching a new number? Dead center?

This is enough to get precise time within about 90s.

If the hour hand is a little past 5, I know the minute hand is between 12 and 4. Oh, it’s between the 2 and 3. Closer to the 2 but definitely past it.

It’s 5:12. Maybe 5:13. Maybe 5:11. Probably 5:12.

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HubertManne@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I would call that down to the seconds accuracy. Minute accuracy is like plus or minus 59 seconds. I mean if something is not using ntp or such it can be off by a minute easily enough.

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TheV2@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
It depends, but in most cases I can’t determine the exact minute on an analog clock. In practice, the quickest way is to choose the worse case.

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Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Hell nah. I just look at the hour hand and how far away the minute hand is away from the 6. Before the 6, Hour O’clock. After the 6, Hour 30.

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Stillwater@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Memorize visually how far into a new minute marker the hand is when a new minute ticks over. So the moment it switches from 9:22 to 9:23, is the hand directly over the line, or maybe aligned on the left edge? Then use that as a mental model for future comparisons

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- bamboo@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  You don’t need to memorize it really, just have to generalize the position of the minute hand past the last round number. Is it about 40% between the 2 and the 3, then that’s a 12.
  
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