This blog will be helpful for those who are studying Korean language and want to improve their vocabulary skills.
Today we're looking at words related to the different time and duration of the year, month and days how to write it in Korean.
The word used to tell time is 시 or 시간. The difference between the two is that 시 is used specifically for telling time whereas 시간 is for an amount of time.
Some useful phrases to remember :
1) What time is it now?
지금 몇 시예요?
2) It's 5 pm now.
지금은 오후 5시예요.
3) What time should we meet?
우리 몇 시에 만날까요?
4) How about meeting at 5 o'clock?
5시에 만나면 어때요?
Sino-Korean numbers are used to denote the number of days. The counter for days is 일
일일 - 1 Day (Ir-il)
이일 - 2 day (I-il)
삼일 - 3 day (Sam-il)
사일 - 4 day (Sa-il)
Some useful vocabulary related to days :
A couple days ago | 엊그제 |
Day before yesterday | 그저께 |
Yesterday | 어제 |
Today | 오늘 |
Tomorrow | 내일 |
The day after tomorrow | 모레 / 내일 모레 |
All day long | 하루 종일 |
Everyday | 매일 / 날마다 |
A few days | 며칠 |
We use Sino-Korean numbers for weeks as well.
The counter for week is 주
일주 - 1 week (Il-ju)
이주 - 2 week (I-ju)
삼주 - 3 week (Sam-ju)
Week | 주 |
Weekend | 주말 |
Weekday | 평일 |
Day of the week | 요일 |
Last week | 지난주 |
The week before last | 지지난주 |
This week | 이번주 |
Next week | 다음주 |
Week after next week | 다다음주 |
Every week | 매주 |
That’s because the months are just the Sino Korean number + the word for month, which is 월 (wol). Let's take a look:
January: 일월 (irwol)
February: 이월 (iwol)
March: 섬월 (samwol)
April: 서월 (sawol)
May: 오월 (owol)
June: 유월 (yuwol)
July: 칠월 (chirwol)
August: 팔월 (parwol)
September: 구시월 (guwol)
October: 시월 (siwol)
November: 십일월 (sibirwol)
December: 십이월 (sibiwol)
Counter for year is 년
일년 (Il-nyeon) - First year
이년 (I-nyeon) - Second year
For saying specific years you can just use 년 after the year.
Eg : 2021년
To say the day, August 15th, 2020 : 2020년 8월 15일.
Some useful vocabulary related to years :
- 시대 - an epoch, a period in time
- 수년 - several years
- 수년간 - for several years
- 수년 전 - some years ago
- 수십년 - several decades
- 세기 - century
- 한 세기 - a century (counting)
- 두 세기 - 2 centuries
- 수세기 - several centuries
- 이십일세기 - 21st century
- 수백년 - hundreds
Some other useful vocabulary related to time and day :
Half the daylight hours (usually about 6 hours) | 나절, 한나절 |
Quarter the daylight hours (usually about 3 hours) | 반나절 |
Day | 일 |
Day (Native Korean word) | 날 |
Morning (AM) | 오전 |
Afternoon (PM) | 오후 |
Morning | 아침 |
Noon | 정오 |
Day | 낮 |
Evening | 저녁 |
Night | 밤 |
Midnight | 자정 |
Dawn | 새벽 |
Right now | 지금 |
Now | 이제 |
Later (shorter time period) | 이따가 / 이따 |
Later (longer time period) | 나중에 |
At the time of | 당시 |
Date | 날짜 |
Hour | 시 |
Minute | 분 |
Second | 초 |
Time | 시간 |
Moment | 때 |
From | ~부터 |
Until | ~까지, ~껏 |
During, duration of, middle of | ~동안, ~간, ~중(에) |
After | ~후(에) |
Before | ~전(에) |
A period in time | 시대 |
To understand TOPIK Test structure, application process, Levels and Passing scores etc. check these pages:
- TOPIK – The Complete Guide & 2. TOPIK Levels and Passing Marks. You can also Practice Online with TOPIK GUIDE Mock Tests.
If you are going to take the TOPIK Test for the first time, or if you want to give your score a boost so that you can pass a higher level, we would strongly advise you to get the Complete Guide to TOPIK – Self-Study Package. It is a digital study package that has everything you need to get a great score in the TOPIK test – all the past TOPIK papers with answer sheets, grammar and vocabulary study material, video tutorials explaining the test structure, strategies to solve them and much more. You can check out more details about this study package HERE.
Learning Korean can be tricky, especially when the goal of your learning is conversation. If you’ve ever attempted to speak Korean but were unable to, then hopefully you’ll find this post helpful.
Thank you for reading. If you have any questions or suggestions. Comment down below.
