Days, Dates & Time

Esperanto Basic Conversation 1

Chapter 7 · Days, Dates & Telling the Time

📅 Days, Dates & Telling the Time — Tagoj, datoj kaj horoj

This chapter has three parts. Part 1 covers today, tomorrow and the days of the week. Part 2 covers the months, ordinal numbers and dates. Part 3 teaches the clock. Esperanto time-words are regular: every day and month is a noun ending in -o, and the ordinal numbers are the numbers you know plus -a. Days and months are written without capital letters.

🗝️ Key Phrases — Gravaj frazoj

1️⃣ Part 1 — Today, Tomorrow and the Days — Tagoj

The three key time words are hodiaŭ (today), morgaŭ (tomorrow) and hieraŭ (yesterday). The days of the week are all nouns in -o.

2️⃣ Part 2 — Months, Ordinals and Dates — Monatoj kaj datoj

An ordinal number (first, second, third …) is the cardinal number plus the adjective ending -a: tri → tria. There are no exceptions: unu becomes unua, du becomes dua, and for larger numbers only the last word takes the -a (dudek sesa). Dates use la, the ordinal, de and the month.

3️⃣ Part 3 — Telling the Time — La horo

The question is Kioma horo estas? The answer uses la and the ordinal of the hour: Estas la tria (it's three). For minutes past the hour, add kaj and the number of minutes: la oka kaj dek kvin (8:15). Half past is kaj duono (or simply kaj tridek). To say "at" a time, use je: je la deka (at ten).

To say whether it is morning or evening, use the adverbs matene (in the morning), posttagmeze (in the afternoon) and vespere (in the evening): je la oka matene (at eight in the morning), je la oka vespere (at eight in the evening). For timetables, the 24-hour clock works the same way: la dek kvara kaj tridek (14:30).

🔤 Three Verbs for Time — Verboj

📖 Vocabulary — Vortaro

20 key words. The Stress column shows the stressed syllable in CAPITALS.

✍️ Try It Yourself — Ekzercoj

Say each answer out loud first, then click to check.