Convert seconds, minutes, hours and days
A duration can be expressed in one unit or broken into parts. Ninety minutes, 1.5 hours, and 1 hour 30 minutes describe the same length of time, but each format suits different tasks.
Exact relationships
One minute is exactly 60 seconds. One hour is 60 minutes or 3,600 seconds. One 24-hour day is 1,440 minutes or 86,400 seconds.
The converter treats a day as a fixed 24-hour duration. A calendar day can behave differently around time zones and daylight-saving changes.
Decimal time is not clock notation
1.5 hours means one and a half hours: 1 hour 30 minutes. It does not mean 1 hour 50 minutes. Multiply the decimal part by 60.
For example, 2.25 hours is 2 hours plus 0.25 × 60 minutes, or 2 hours 15 minutes. In the other direction, 2 hours 45 minutes is 2.75 hours.
Timesheets and paid work
Timesheets often use decimal hours because they are easy to total and multiply by an hourly rate. Check the organisation’s rounding and break rules. A mathematical conversion cannot decide overtime, unpaid breaks, or employment terms.
Travel and connections
Convert every leg, transfer, and wait to minutes before adding them, then display the total as hours and minutes. If departure and arrival are in different time zones, account for the zone change separately.
Large second counts
Technical systems, video, and fitness data often store seconds. 90,061 seconds is 1 day, 1 hour, 1 minute, and 1 second. A breakdown is easier to read; a total in seconds is easier for software calculations.
Months and years
Months and years have variable lengths, so they do not belong in a simple exact converter. A month can have 28–31 days and leap years have 366 days.
Finally, distinguish a duration from a time of day. Three hours converts directly; 03:00 needs a date and time zone for international comparison.