Minute to Century Converter
Convert minutes to centuries with our free online time converter.
Quick Answer
1 Minute = 1.901324e-8 centuries
Formula: Minute × conversion factor = Century
Use the calculator below for instant, accurate conversions.
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Minute to Century Calculator
How to Use the Minute to Century Calculator:
- Enter the value you want to convert in the 'From' field (Minute).
- The converted value in Century will appear automatically in the 'To' field.
- Use the dropdown menus to select different units within the Time category.
- Click the swap button (⇌) to reverse the conversion direction.
How to Convert Minute to Century: Step-by-Step Guide
Converting Minute to Century involves multiplying the value by a specific conversion factor, as shown in the formula below.
Formula:
1 Minute = 1.9013e-8 centuriesExample Calculation:
Convert 60 minutes: 60 × 1.9013e-8 = 1.1408e-6 centuries
Disclaimer: For Reference Only
These conversion results are provided for informational purposes only. While we strive for accuracy, we make no guarantees regarding the precision of these results, especially for conversions involving extremely large or small numbers which may be subject to the inherent limitations of standard computer floating-point arithmetic.
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Need to convert to other time units?
View all Time conversions →What is a Minute and a Century?
The minute (symbol: min) is a unit of time equal to 60 seconds or 1/60 of an hour (exactly 0.016̄ hours, or approximately 0.0167 hours).
Official SI-derived definition: Since the second was redefined atomically in 1967, one minute equals exactly 60 seconds, where each second is the duration of 9,192,631,770 periods of radiation from caesium-133 atoms. Therefore:
- 1 minute = 60 × 9,192,631,770 = 551,558,906,200 caesium-133 oscillations
Practical conversions:
- 1 minute = 60 seconds (exact)
- 1 minute = 0.016666... hours (1/60 hr, exact)
- 1 hour = 60 minutes (exact)
- 1 day = 1,440 minutes (24 × 60)
- 1 week = 10,080 minutes (7 × 24 × 60)
- 1 year (365 days) = 525,600 minutes (memorably featured in the musical Rent)
The minute is not an SI base unit, but it is accepted for use with the SI alongside hours, days, and other traditional time units due to its universal cultural importance and practical utility.
Why 60?
The choice of 60 comes from ancient Babylonian sexagesimal (base-60) mathematics, developed around 3000 BCE. The Babylonians chose 60 because it's highly divisible:
- Factors of 60: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30, 60 (12 factors!)
- This makes fractions like 1/2 (30 min), 1/3 (20 min), 1/4 (15 min), 1/5 (12 min), 1/6 (10 min) all whole numbers
- Contrast with decimal: 100 only has factors 1, 2, 4, 5, 10, 20, 25, 50, 100 (9 factors, and divisions like 1/3 = 33.33...)
This mathematical convenience made base-60 ideal for astronomy, geometry, and timekeeping—fields requiring frequent division. The system persists today in our 60-minute hours, 60-second minutes, and 360-degree circles (6 × 60).
A century is a unit of time equal to 100 consecutive years. The word derives from Latin "centum" (one hundred).
Duration in Other Units
1 century equals:
- 100 years (exactly)
- 10 decades (100 ÷ 10)
- 1,200 months (100 × 12)
- ~5,217 weeks (100 × 52.17)
- 36,524 days (100 common years) or 36,525 days (accounting for ~25 leap years)
- Average: 36,525 days (100 × 365.25)
- 876,600 hours (36,525 × 24)
- 52,596,000 minutes (876,600 × 60)
- 3,155,760,000 seconds (52,596,000 × 60)
Century Boundaries: The 1 vs. 0 Debate
Formal reckoning (technically correct):
- 1st century: 1-100 CE
- 18th century: 1701-1800
- 19th century: 1801-1900
- 20th century: 1901-2000
- 21st century: 2001-2100
Why? Because there was no year 0 in the Gregorian calendar (1 BCE → 1 CE directly), the first century was years 1-100, not 0-99.
Popular usage (dominant in practice):
- 18th century: "The 1700s" (1700-1799)
- 19th century: "The 1800s" (1800-1899)
- 20th century: "The 1900s" (1900-1999)
- 21st century: "The 2000s onward" (2000-2099)
Reality: Popular usage dominates. When people say "20th century," they typically mean 1900-1999, not 1901-2000. The millennium celebration happened January 1, 2000, not January 1, 2001, despite formal correctness.
Note: The Minute is part of the imperial/US customary system, primarily used in the US, UK, and Canada for everyday measurements. The Century belongs to the imperial/US customary system.
History of the Minute and Century
of the Minute
Ancient Babylonian Origins (c. 3000 BCE)
The foundation of the minute lies in the Sumerian and Babylonian sexagesimal (base-60) number system developed in ancient Mesopotamia around 3000 BCE. The Babylonians used this system for:
- Astronomical calculations: Dividing the celestial sphere and tracking planetary movements
- Geometric measurements: Dividing circles into 360 degrees (6 × 60)
- Mathematical computations: Facilitating complex fractions and divisions
- Calendar systems: Organizing time into convenient subdivisions
Cuneiform tablets from this era show sophisticated astronomical observations recorded using base-60 divisions, laying groundwork for the eventual minute.
Greek Astronomical Adoption (150 CE)
The ancient Greeks, particularly Claudius Ptolemy (c. 100-170 CE), formalized the division of hours and degrees into 60 parts in his astronomical treatise Almagest. Ptolemy used Latin terminology inherited from earlier traditions:
- "pars minuta prima" (first minute/small part) = 1/60 of a degree or hour → modern minute
- "pars minuta secunda" (second minute/small part) = 1/60 of a minute = 1/3600 of a degree/hour → modern second
These terms were primarily used for angular measurement in astronomy and navigation (describing positions of stars and planets), not yet for practical daily timekeeping.
Medieval Islamic and European Transmission (800-1300 CE)
During the Islamic Golden Age (8th-13th centuries), Arab astronomers and mathematicians preserved and expanded on Greek astronomical texts, continuing to use the 60-part division system.
When European scholars translated Arabic astronomical manuscripts in the 12th and 13th centuries (particularly at translation centers in Toledo, Spain, and Sicily), they reintroduced the Latin terms "pars minuta prima" and "pars minuta secunda" to European scholarship.
However, these remained primarily theoretical and astronomical units. Practical timekeeping in medieval Europe relied on:
- Sundials (showing hours)
- Water clocks (clepsydrae)
- Candle clocks (burning time)
- Church bells marking canonical hours (Matins, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers, Compline)
None of these devices tracked minutes—they were too imprecise, and daily life didn't require such granularity.
Mechanical Clocks Emerge—But No Minute Hands (1300s)
The first mechanical clocks appeared in Europe around 1280-1300, installed in church towers and public buildings. Early examples include:
- Salisbury Cathedral clock (England, c. 1386) - still running, one of the oldest working clocks
- Wells Cathedral clock (England, c. 1390)
- Prague Astronomical Clock (Czech Republic, 1410)
Crucially, these early clocks had only an HOUR hand. They were too inaccurate (losing or gaining 15-30 minutes per day) to justify displaying minutes. The concept of "being on time" to the minute was essentially meaningless when clocks could drift that much daily.
Pendulum Revolution: Minutes Become Meaningful (1656)
The transformative moment for minute-level timekeeping came with Christiaan Huygens' invention of the pendulum clock in 1656. This invention improved timekeeping accuracy from errors of 15 minutes per day to less than 15 seconds per day—a roughly 60-fold improvement.
Why pendulums revolutionized accuracy:
- A pendulum's swing period depends only on its length and gravity (Galileo's discovery, 1602)
- Length is constant → period is constant → highly regular "tick"
- Formula: Period = 2π√(L/g), where L = length, g = gravitational acceleration
- A 1-meter pendulum has a period of approximately 2 seconds—perfect for timekeeping
With this accuracy, displaying minutes became both practical and necessary. Clockmakers began adding minute hands to clock faces around 1660-1680.
Minute Hands Become Standard (1670-1750)
By the late 17th century:
- 1670s: Quality clocks routinely featured minute hands
- 1680s: Balance spring invention (Huygens and Robert Hooke) further improved accuracy, enabling portable watches to track minutes
- 1700s: Minute display became universal on both public clocks and personal timepieces
- 1761: John Harrison's H4 marine chronometer achieved extraordinary accuracy (losing only 5 seconds on a 81-day voyage), revolutionizing navigation
The minute transformed from an astronomical abstraction to a practical daily measurement, changing social organization fundamentally.
Societal Impact: The "Minute Culture" (1800s)
The 19th century saw the rise of minute-precise scheduling, driven by:
-
Railroad timetables (1840s onward):
- Trains required synchronized schedules to prevent collisions
- Railway time standardized clocks across regions
- Timetables specified arrivals/departures to the minute
- This drove development of time zones and standard time
-
Factory work and "time discipline" (Industrial Revolution):
- Factory shifts started at precise times (e.g., 7:00 AM, not "dawn")
- Workers punched time clocks tracking arrival to the minute
- The concept of "being late" became economically significant
- Frederick Winslow Taylor's "scientific management" (1880s-1910s) measured work tasks in minutes and seconds
-
Urban life coordination:
- Meeting times specified to the minute
- Public transportation schedules
- School bell systems marking class periods
This represented a profound cultural shift: pre-industrial societies organized time around seasonal cycles, sunlight, and approximate "hours." Industrial society required minute-level coordination of human activity.
Atomic Age: Minutes Defined by Seconds (1967-Present)
When the second was redefined in 1967 based on caesium-133 atomic oscillations (9,192,631,770 cycles = 1 second), the minute automatically inherited this precision:
1 minute = exactly 60 × 9,192,631,770 caesium oscillations = 551,558,906,200 caesium oscillations
Modern atomic clocks maintain this definition with extraordinary stability, losing less than 1 second in 100 million years. This means the minute is now defined with sub-nanosecond precision, far beyond any practical human need but essential for:
- GPS systems (requiring nanosecond synchronization)
- Financial trading (high-frequency trading in microseconds)
- Telecommunications (network synchronization)
- Scientific experiments (particle physics, gravitational wave detection)
The "525,600 Minutes" Cultural Moment (1996)
In 1996, the musical Rent by Jonathan Larson opened on Broadway, featuring the iconic song "Seasons of Love," which begins:
"Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes... How do you measure, measure a year?"
This number—525,600 minutes = 365 days × 24 hours × 60 minutes—became a cultural touchstone, highlighting the minute as a unit for measuring the passage of life itself, not just scheduling appointments.
of the Century Concept
1. Ancient Origins: Roman Centuria (509 BCE - 27 BCE)
Roman military organization:
- Centuria (plural: centuriae) = Roman military unit of approximately 100 soldiers (later reduced to 80)
- Led by a centurion (centurio)
- Latin "centum" = one hundred
- 6 centuries = 1 cohort; 10 cohorts = 1 legion (~6,000 soldiers)
Early timekeeping:
- Romans used Ab urbe condita (AUC, "from the founding of the city") dating from Rome's legendary founding (753 BCE)
- No systematic use of "century" for 100-year periods yet
- Time organized by consulships, reigns, dynasties
2. Calendar Development and Anno Domini Dating (1 CE - 1582 CE)
Anno Domini (AD) system:
- Dionysius Exiguus (c. 525 CE): Calculated years from Jesus Christ's birth
- Introduced Anno Domini (AD, "in the year of the Lord") dating
- Critical error: No year 0 (went directly from 1 BCE to 1 CE)
- This creates century boundary confusion still debated today
Julian Calendar (46 BCE - 1582 CE):
- Julius Caesar introduced 365.25-day year (leap year every 4 years)
- Provided stable framework for long-term chronology
- Enabled systematic dating of events over centuries
Gregorian Calendar Reform (1582 CE):
- Pope Gregory XIII corrected Julian calendar drift
- Established modern calendar system still used today
- Removed 10 days (October 4, 1582 → October 15, 1582)
- Century years divisible by 400 are leap years (1600, 2000), others not (1700, 1800, 1900)
3. Renaissance and Enlightenment: Historical Periodization (1400s-1700s)
Systematic historiography emerged:
- 15th-16th centuries: Renaissance scholars developed historical chronologies
- 17th-18th centuries: Enlightenment historians systematized century-based periodization
- Edward Gibbon (Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1776-1789): Used century-scale analysis
Why centuries became standard:
- Generational scale: ~4 generations per century = intergenerational change visible but comprehensible
- Administrative records: Tax records, census data, government documents accumulated over centuries
- Pattern recognition: 100-year scale reveals structural changes invisible in decade-scale analysis
- Round number psychology: Base-10 counting makes 100-year periods psychologically satisfying
Periodization labels emerged:
- "The 16th century" = 1500s Renaissance, Reformation
- "The 17th century" = 1600s Scientific Revolution, Baroque
- "The 18th century" = 1700s Age of Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution begins
4. 19th Century: Century as Historical Framework (1801-1900)
The "long 19th century" concept:
- Historians sometimes define as 1789-1914 (French Revolution to WWI)
- Captures coherent historical era despite not matching formal century boundaries
Major 19th-century transformations:
- Industrial Revolution (1760-1840): Steam power, factories, railroads
- Urbanization: Rural → urban population shift
- Imperialism: European colonial empires peak
- Scientific progress: Darwin, Maxwell, Mendel
- Political revolutions: 1848 Revolutions, unification of Germany/Italy
- Technological: Telegraph, telephone, photography, electricity
Century consciousness:
- People in 1800s increasingly thought in century-scale terms
- "The spirit of the 19th century" = common phrase
- Fin de siècle (end of century, 1890s-1900s) = cultural movement
5. 20th Century: Century of Extremes (1901-2000)
Eric Hobsbawm's "short 20th century" (1914-1991):
- WWI start to Soviet Union collapse
- Captures coherent historical narrative despite formal century boundaries
Major 20th-century transformations:
- World Wars: WWI (1914-1918), WWII (1939-1945)
- Ideological conflict: Fascism, Communism, Capitalism compete
- Cold War (1947-1991): US vs. USSR, nuclear arms race
- Decolonization: European empires disintegrate (1940s-1970s)
- Technological revolutions:
- Automobiles, airplanes (early 1900s)
- Nuclear energy (1940s)
- Computers (1940s-1950s)
- Space exploration (1950s-1960s)
- Internet (1990s)
- Mobile phones (1990s-2000s)
- Population explosion: 1.6 billion (1900) → 6.1 billion (2000)
- Medical advances: Antibiotics, vaccines, life expectancy doubled
- Environmental: Climate change, ozone depletion, biodiversity loss
Century labeling:
- "The American Century" (Henry Luce, 1941): US dominance of 20th century
- "The People's Century" (BBC, 1995): Mass politics, democracy spread
6. 21st Century: Digital Age and Beyond (2001-Present)
Millennium transition debate:
- Popular celebration: January 1, 2000 (Y2K)
- Formal start: January 1, 2001
- Most people celebrated 2000 despite pedantic correctness
21st-century defining features (so far):
- 9/11 attacks (2001): "War on Terror" begins
- Digital revolution: Smartphones ubiquitous (iPhone 2007)
- Social media: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok
- Climate crisis: Accelerating global warming, extreme weather
- COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2023): Global disruption
- AI revolution: ChatGPT (2022), generative AI breakthroughs
- Geopolitical shifts: Rise of China, multipolar world
- Economic: 2008 Financial Crisis, wealth inequality
"21st-century skills": Digital literacy, critical thinking, adaptability
Common Uses and Applications: minutes vs centuries
Explore the typical applications for both Minute (imperial/US) and Century (imperial/US) to understand their common contexts.
Common Uses for minutes
and Applications
1. Time Management and Productivity
The minute is the fundamental unit for personal and professional time management:
- Pomodoro Technique: Work in 25-minute focused sessions, followed by 5-minute breaks
- Time blocking: Schedule day in 15-, 30-, or 60-minute blocks
- Task estimation: "This report will take 45 minutes"
- Billable hours: Professional services (lawyers, consultants) often bill in 6-minute increments (0.1 hour)
- Timesheet tracking: Many systems track work time to the minute
Digital tools: Calendar apps (Google Calendar, Outlook), time tracking software (Toggl, RescueTime), and project management platforms (Asana, Monday.com) all operate on minute-based scheduling.
2. Scheduling and Appointments
Minutes enable precise coordination of activities:
- Appointment times: "Dentist at 3:15 PM" (hours and minutes)
- Event start times: "Meeting begins at 10:30 AM sharp"
- Transit timetables: "Train departs at 8:47 AM"
- Reservation systems: OpenTable shows "5:30 PM" or "8:45 PM" slots
- Class schedules: "Period 3: 10:25-11:15 AM" (50-minute period)
Buffer times: Professional schedulers often include 5-10 minute buffers between appointments to prevent domino-effect delays.
3. Sports and Athletic Competition
Many sports use minutes for game structure and performance measurement:
-
Game periods:
- Soccer: Two 45-minute halves
- Basketball (NBA): Four 12-minute quarters = 48 minutes total
- Basketball (NCAA): Two 20-minute halves = 40 minutes
- Hockey: Three 20-minute periods
- Rugby: Two 40-minute halves
-
Penalties and suspensions:
- Hockey penalty box: 2-minute, 4-minute, or 5-minute penalties
- Soccer yellow card: 10-minute sin bin (trial rule in some leagues)
-
Running performance:
- Mile time: 4-6 minutes (recreational), under 4 minutes (elite)
- 5K time: 15-30 minutes (recreational), 13-15 minutes (competitive)
- Marathon pace: Expressed as minutes per mile/km
-
Timeouts:
- NBA timeout: 75 seconds (1.25 minutes) or 30 seconds
- NFL timeout: Each team gets three per half
- College football: 1-minute timeouts
4. Navigation and Geography
Beyond time measurement, "minute" has a distinct meaning in navigation:
Arcminute (minute of arc):
- Symbol: ′ (prime symbol)
- 1 arcminute = 1/60 of a degree of angle
- 1 degree = 60 arcminutes = 60′
- 1 arcminute = 60 arcseconds = 60″
Latitude and longitude:
- Geographic coordinates: 40°45′30″N, 73°59′00″W (New York City)
- Reads as: "40 degrees, 45 minutes, 30 seconds North; 73 degrees, 59 minutes, 0 seconds West"
Nautical mile:
- 1 nautical mile = 1 arcminute of latitude (approximately 1,852 meters)
- This makes ocean navigation calculations elegant: traveling 60 nautical miles north changes your latitude by 1 degree
Map precision:
- 1 arcminute of latitude ≈ 1.85 km (1.15 miles)
- 1 arcminute of longitude ≈ 1.85 km at equator (decreases toward poles)
- Modern GPS coordinates often express minutes with decimal precision: 40°45.5′N
5. Digital Timekeeping and Computing
Computers and digital devices track time in minutes (and smaller units):
- System clocks: Display hours:minutes (14:35) or hours:minutes:seconds (14:35:47)
- File timestamps: Modified time recorded as YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS
- Cron jobs: Unix/Linux scheduled tasks use minute-level specification (0-59)
- Session timeouts: "Session will expire in 5 minutes of inactivity"
- Auto-save intervals: Microsoft Word auto-saves every 10 minutes (default)
- Video timestamps: YouTube shows 5:23 (5 minutes, 23 seconds)
- Countdown timers: Online cooking timers, exam clocks, auction endings
6. Aviation and Air Travel
The aviation industry relies heavily on minute-precise timing:
- Flight schedules: Departure 10:25 AM, arrival 1:47 PM (all times to the minute)
- Flight duration: "Flight time: 2 hours 34 minutes"
- Boarding times: "Boarding begins 30 minutes before departure"
- Gate changes: "Gate closes 10 minutes before departure"
- Air traffic control: Separation requirements measured in minutes between aircraft
- Fuel planning: Reserve fuel calculated for 30-45 minutes of additional flight time
7. Education and Testing
Academic settings structure learning and assessment by minutes:
-
Class periods:
- Elementary school: 45-60 minute periods
- High school: 50-minute periods (traditional) or 90-minute blocks
- University lecture: 50 minutes ("hour" classes), 80 minutes (longer sessions)
- "10-minute break" between classes
-
Standardized tests:
- SAT Reading section: 65 minutes
- SAT Math (calculator): 55 minutes
- ACT Science: 35 minutes
- GRE Verbal section: 30 minutes
- LSAT Logical Reasoning: 35 minutes per section
-
Test-taking strategy: Students allocate time per question (e.g., "100 questions in 60 minutes = 36 seconds per question")
8. Parking and Paid Time
Many services charge based on minute increments:
-
Parking meters:
- 15-minute minimum in some cities
- $2 per hour = $0.50 per 15 minutes
- Digital meters show minutes remaining
-
Bike/scooter sharing:
- Lime, Bird, Citibike: Charge per minute (e.g., $0.39/min)
- "Unlock fee + per-minute rate"
-
Phone plans (historical):
- Pre-smartphone era: Plans sold as "450 minutes per month"
- Long-distance charges: "5¢ per minute"
- Modern shift: Unlimited minutes, data caps instead
-
Professional services:
- Legal billing: Often in 6-minute increments (1/10 hour)
- Therapy sessions: 50-minute "hour" (allows 10 minutes for notes)
- Consulting rates: "$200/hour" = $3.33/minute
9. Emergency Services
Response time measured in minutes can mean life or death:
-
Response time targets:
- Ambulance (urban): 8 minutes average target
- Fire department: 4-minute turnout time (from alarm to truck departure)
- Police: Varies widely, 5-10 minutes for priority calls
-
Emergency medical guidelines:
- Start CPR within 1 minute of cardiac arrest recognition
- Defibrillation within 3-5 minutes of cardiac arrest improves survival
- Every 1-minute delay in defibrillation decreases survival by 7-10%
- "Time is tissue" in stroke care: Every minute counts
-
911 call processing:
- Average call duration: 2-3 minutes
- Location identification: Should be under 30 seconds
- "Stay on the line" until help arrives
When to Use centuries
and Applications
1. Historical Analysis and Research
Century-by-century comparison:
- Economic growth: "19th-century industrialization vs. 20th-century information age"
- Warfare evolution: "19th-century muskets → 20th-century machine guns → 21st-century drones"
- Life expectancy trends: Analyzed century-by-century
Academic papers:
- "This study examines voting patterns across two centuries (1800s-1900s)"
- "Century-scale climate reconstructions"
2. Art, Literature, and Cultural Studies
Periodization:
- "18th-century literature": Age of Enlightenment, Voltaire, Swift, Johnson
- "19th-century novel": Dickens, Austen, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky
- "20th-century art": Impressionism, Cubism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism
Art history courses: Often organized by century ("Art of the 17th Century")
3. Genealogy and Family History
Tracing ancestry:
- 4-5 generations per century = century scale ideal for family trees
- "My great-great-grandfather lived in the 19th century"
- Immigration records, census data organized by century
Life stages across centuries:
- Born late 1800s, died mid-1900s = lived through two centuries
4. Climate and Environmental Science
Century-scale climate patterns:
- Medieval Warm Period (10th-13th centuries): Warmer than average
- Little Ice Age (14th-19th centuries): Cooler than average
- 20th-21st century warming: Anthropogenic climate change
Projections:
- "By end of 21st century, sea level rise 1-2 meters"
5. Economic and Development Studies
Long-term economic trends:
- 19th century: Agricultural → industrial economies
- 20th century: Industrial → service/information economies
- 21st century: Digital/knowledge economies
Development indicators: Tracked over centuries (literacy, GDP, poverty)
6. Philosophy and Long-Term Thinking
"Think in centuries":
- Long Now Foundation: 10,000-year thinking
- Contrast with short-term thinking (quarterly earnings, election cycles)
Philosophical movements:
- 18th century: Enlightenment rationalism
- 19th century: Romanticism, existentialism emerges
- 20th century: Postmodernism
7. Legal and Property Rights
Land ownership records:
- Property deeds reference century-old transactions
- "Century farms": Farms in same family 100+ years
Copyright:
- Life + 70 years = often extends into next century after author's death
Additional Unit Information
About Minute (min)
How many seconds are in a minute?
Exactly 60 seconds. This has been standardized since medieval times and is based on the Babylonian base-60 (sexagesimal) number system. Since 1967, when the second was redefined using atomic cesium-133 clocks, one minute equals precisely 60 atomic seconds, or 551,558,906,200 oscillations of caesium-133 radiation.
How many minutes are in an hour?
Exactly 60 minutes. This also comes from Babylonian mathematics. The hour was divided into 60 "first small parts" (Latin: pars minuta prima = minutes), just as each minute is divided into 60 "second small parts" (Latin: pars minuta secunda = seconds).
Why are there 60 minutes in an hour, not 100?
The base-60 system comes from ancient Babylonian mathematics (c. 3000 BCE). The Babylonians chose 60 because it's highly divisible—it has 12 factors (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30, 60), making fractions much simpler:
- 1/2 hour = 30 min (whole number)
- 1/3 hour = 20 min (whole number)
- 1/4 hour = 15 min (whole number)
- 1/5 hour = 12 min (whole number)
- 1/6 hour = 10 min (whole number)
Contrast with 100 (decimal): 1/3 of 100 = 33.33... (repeating decimal). The Babylonians had sophisticated astronomy requiring complex divisions, so base-60 was superior.
How many minutes are in a day?
1,440 minutes in one 24-hour day.
Calculation: 24 hours × 60 minutes/hour = 1,440 minutes
Breakdown:
- 12 hours (half day) = 720 minutes
- 6 hours (quarter day) = 360 minutes
- 1 hour = 60 minutes
How many minutes are in a year?
525,600 minutes in a standard 365-day year.
Calculation: 365 days × 24 hours × 60 minutes = 525,600 minutes
This number was popularized by the opening song "Seasons of Love" from the 1996 Broadway musical Rent:
"Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes... How do you measure, measure a year?"
For a leap year (366 days): 527,040 minutes (1,440 more minutes).
What's the difference between a minute of time and an arcminute?
Time minute: A unit of duration equal to 60 seconds.
- Symbol: min (or sometimes just listed as "minutes")
- Used for measuring elapsed time, scheduling, etc.
Arcminute (minute of arc): A unit of angular measurement equal to 1/60 of a degree.
- Symbol: ′ (prime symbol)
- Used in astronomy, navigation, and geographic coordinates
- Example: 40°45′30″N = 40 degrees, 45 arcminutes, 30 arcseconds North latitude
Key connection: In navigation, 1 arcminute of latitude = 1 nautical mile (approximately 1,852 meters). This elegant relationship makes nautical charts and navigation calculations simpler.
Same name, different measurements:
- Both descend from the Latin pars minuta prima (first small part) referring to 1/60 divisions
- Context clarifies which is meant
How do I convert minutes to decimal hours?
Formula: Decimal hours = minutes ÷ 60
Examples:
- 30 minutes = 30 ÷ 60 = 0.5 hours
- 15 minutes = 15 ÷ 60 = 0.25 hours
- 45 minutes = 45 ÷ 60 = 0.75 hours
- 90 minutes = 90 ÷ 60 = 1.5 hours
- 20 minutes = 20 ÷ 60 = 0.333... hours (approximately 0.33)
Common conversions:
- 6 minutes = 0.1 hours (used in legal billing: 0.1 hour increments)
- 12 minutes = 0.2 hours
- 18 minutes = 0.3 hours
- 36 minutes = 0.6 hours
Reverse (decimal hours to minutes): Multiply decimal part by 60
- Example: 1.75 hours = 1 hour + (0.75 × 60) = 1 hour 45 minutes
How do I convert hours:minutes format to just minutes?
Formula: Total minutes = (hours × 60) + minutes
Examples:
- 1:30 (1 hour 30 min) = (1 × 60) + 30 = 90 minutes
- 2:15 (2 hours 15 min) = (2 × 60) + 15 = 135 minutes
- 0:45 (45 minutes) = (0 × 60) + 45 = 45 minutes
- 3:20 (3 hours 20 min) = (3 × 60) + 20 = 200 minutes
- 8:00 (8 hours) = (8 × 60) + 0 = 480 minutes (full work day)
This is useful for calculating total duration, comparing times, or doing time arithmetic.
When did clocks start showing minutes?
Early mechanical clocks (1300s-1650s) had only hour hands because they weren't accurate enough to justify showing minutes. Early clocks could lose or gain 15-30 minutes per day.
Minute hands appeared around 1670-1680, shortly after Christiaan Huygens invented the pendulum clock in 1656, which improved accuracy from ~15 minutes/day error to ~15 seconds/day error—a roughly 60× improvement.
Key timeline:
- 1656: Huygens invents pendulum clock
- 1657: First pendulum clocks built (with minute hands)
- 1670s: Minute hands become standard on quality clocks
- 1675: Balance spring invented (Huygens/Hooke), further improving accuracy
- 1680s: Pocket watches begin including minute hands
- 1700s: Minute display becomes universal
Before this, society didn't need minute-level precision—daily life organized around hours, bells, and approximate times. The pendulum clock created both the technical ability and social need for minute-based scheduling.
Do all countries use minutes the same way?
Yes—the 60-minute hour is universal worldwide. Unlike distance (metric vs. imperial) or temperature (Celsius vs. Fahrenheit), time measurement is globally standardized:
- All countries use 60 seconds per minute
- All countries use 60 minutes per hour
- All countries use 24 hours per day
International Standards:
- ISO 8601 (international date/time standard) uses HH:MM:SS format universally
- Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the global time standard
- All time zones are defined as offsets from UTC (e.g., EST = UTC-5, JST = UTC+9)
Cultural differences in time display (not measurement):
- 12-hour format (US, Canada, Australia, Philippines): 3:45 PM
- 24-hour format (most of world, military, aviation): 15:45
- Both systems use the same 60-minute hours—just different notation
Historical exception: During the French Revolution (1793-1805), France briefly tried decimal time with 100-minute hours, but it was abandoned as impractical.
How do stopwatches and timers measure fractions of a minute?
Stopwatches display time more precisely than minutes using minutes:seconds.deciseconds format:
Common formats:
- M:SS (minutes:seconds) — e.g., 3:45 = 3 minutes, 45 seconds
- M:SS.SS (minutes:seconds.centiseconds) — e.g., 3:45.23 = 3 min, 45.23 sec
- H:MM:SS (hours:minutes:seconds) — e.g., 1:23:45 = 1 hr, 23 min, 45 sec
Precision levels:
- Sport timing: Typically to 0.01 seconds (centiseconds)
- Olympic 100m: 9.58 seconds (Usain Bolt world record)
- Lab/scientific stopwatches: To 0.001 seconds (milliseconds)
- Atomic clocks: To nanoseconds (0.000000001 seconds) or better
Digital displays:
- Phone stopwatch: Usually shows minutes:seconds.centiseconds (3:45.67)
- Microwave timer: Usually shows minutes:seconds only (3:45)
- Oven timer: Minutes only for long cooking (45), or minutes:seconds for precise tasks
Fractions of minutes in speech:
- "Three and a half minutes" = 3:30
- "Two minutes thirty seconds" = 2:30
- "Five minutes fifteen seconds" = 5:15
Why do clocks go up to 60 minutes, not continue beyond?
At 60 minutes, the minute counter resets to 0 and the hour increments by 1. This is called modular arithmetic or "clock arithmetic":
- 0 minutes → 1 minute → ... → 59 minutes → 0 minutes (next hour)
- Example: 2:59 PM + 1 minute = 3:00 PM (not 2:60 PM)
Why?
- Babylonian base-60 system: We use 60 as the cycle
- Analog clock design: The minute hand makes one complete circle (360°) per hour, returning to 12
- Mathematical consistency: Just as we don't have 60 seconds (it becomes 1 minute), we don't have 60 minutes (it becomes 1 hour)
Modulo 60:
- In mathematics, this is written as minutes mod 60
- Adding times requires carrying: 45 min + 20 min = 65 min = 1 hr 5 min
- Computer timekeeping uses this logic internally
Exception: Elapsed time can exceed 60 minutes:
- "This meeting lasted 90 minutes" (1 hour 30 minutes)
- Marathon time: 2:15:30 (2 hours, 15 minutes, 30 seconds)
About Century (c)
1. How many years are in a century?
Exactly 100 years. The word "century" comes from Latin "centum" (one hundred).
Other units:
- 1 century = 100 years = 10 decades = 1,200 months = ~36,525 days
2. When did the 21st century begin?
Formal answer: January 1, 2001 (because there was no year 0, the 1st century was years 1-100, so the 21st century is 2001-2100).
Popular answer: January 1, 2000 (most people celebrated the new millennium in 2000, and colloquially refer to "the 2000s" as the start of the 21st century).
Reality: Both are used; formal definition is technically correct, but popular usage dominates in practice.
3. Why is the 1800s called the 19th century?
Because of how centuries are numbered:
- 1st century = years 1-100
- 2nd century = years 101-200
- 18th century = years 1701-1800
- 19th century = years 1801-1900 (the "1800s")
- 20th century = years 1901-2000 (the "1900s")
Rule: Century number = (hundreds digit + 1). So 1800s → century 18+1 = 19th century.
4. How many generations are in a century?
Approximately 4-5 generations, assuming ~20-25 years per generation.
Calculation:
- If generation = 25 years → 100 ÷ 25 = 4 generations per century
- If generation = 20 years → 100 ÷ 20 = 5 generations per century
Example: Great-great-grandparents often lived in a different century than you.
5. Is a century a standard unit in science?
No. The century is not part of the International System of Units (SI). The SI base unit for time is the second.
Scientific time units:
- Years (Julian year = 365.25 days exactly)
- Kiloyears (kyr): 1,000 years
- Megayears (Myr): 1,000,000 years
- Gigayears (Gyr): 1,000,000,000 years
Century usage: Common in history, demography, climate science, but not formal SI unit.
6. How many days are in a century?
Approximately 36,525 days (accounting for leap years).
Calculation:
- 100 years × 365 days = 36,500 days
- Plus ~25 leap days per century = 36,525 days total
Exact number varies: Depends on leap year distribution (Gregorian calendar: 97 leap years per 400 years).
7. What is the difference between centennial and bicentennial?
Centennial: 100th anniversary (1 century)
Bicentennial: 200th anniversary (2 centuries)
Other -ennial terms:
- Sesquicentennial: 150th anniversary (1.5 centuries)
- Tercentennial/Tricentennial: 300th anniversary (3 centuries)
- Quadricentennial: 400th anniversary (4 centuries)
- Quincentennial: 500th anniversary (5 centuries)
8. Can a person live in three different centuries?
Yes, but extremely rare.
Requirements:
- Born in one century (e.g., 1898, 19th century)
- Live through next century (1900s, 20th century)
- Live into third century (2000s, 21st century)
- Requires living 102+ years if born in last years of century
Example: Born December 1898 (19th century) → lived through 20th century (1901-2000) → died January 2001 (21st century) = lived in 3 centuries despite being only 102 years old.
9. What is a "long century" in history?
Historical concept: Period longer than 100 years but representing a coherent historical era.
Famous examples:
- "Long 19th century" (1789-1914): French Revolution to WWI start
- "Long 18th century" (1688-1815): Glorious Revolution to Waterloo
- "Short 20th century" (1914-1991): Conversely, WWI to USSR collapse = only 77 years but captures coherent era
Why useful: Historical eras don't align neatly with formal century boundaries; "long/short century" captures thematic unity.
10. How do I calculate how many centuries between two years?
Formula: centuries = (ending year - starting year) ÷ 100
Examples:
- 1500 to 2000: (2000 - 1500) ÷ 100 = 5 centuries (500 years)
- 1776 to 2024: (2024 - 1776) ÷ 100 = 2.48 centuries (~248 years)
- 1900 to 2100: (2100 - 1900) ÷ 100 = 2 centuries (200 years)
11. What is "fin de siècle"?
French phrase: "End of the century" (literally "end of era")
Historical meaning: Cultural period at end of 19th century (1890s-1900s) characterized by:
- Cultural pessimism mixed with optimism
- Decadence, Art Nouveau
- Anxiety about modernity
- Transition into new century
Modern usage: Any "end of century" cultural moment (Y2K was modern "fin de siècle").
12. How many centuries in a millennium?
10 centuries = 1 millennium
Conversions:
- 1 century = 0.1 millennia (100 years)
- 5 centuries = 0.5 millennia (500 years)
- 10 centuries = 1 millennium (1,000 years)
- 20 centuries = 2 millennia (2,000 years)
Conversion Table: Minute to Century
| Minute (min) | Century (c) |
|---|---|
| 0.5 | 0 |
| 1 | 0 |
| 1.5 | 0 |
| 2 | 0 |
| 5 | 0 |
| 10 | 0 |
| 25 | 0 |
| 50 | 0 |
| 100 | 0 |
| 250 | 0 |
| 500 | 0 |
| 1,000 | 0 |
People Also Ask
How do I convert Minute to Century?
To convert Minute to Century, enter the value in Minute in the calculator above. The conversion will happen automatically. Use our free online converter for instant and accurate results. You can also visit our time converter page to convert between other units in this category.
Learn more →What is the conversion factor from Minute to Century?
The conversion factor depends on the specific relationship between Minute and Century. You can find the exact conversion formula and factor on this page. Our calculator handles all calculations automatically. See the conversion table above for common values.
Can I convert Century back to Minute?
Yes! You can easily convert Century back to Minute by using the swap button (⇌) in the calculator above, or by visiting our Century to Minute converter page. You can also explore other time conversions on our category page.
Learn more →What are common uses for Minute and Century?
Minute and Century are both standard units used in time measurements. They are commonly used in various applications including engineering, construction, cooking, and scientific research. Browse our time converter for more conversion options.
For more time conversion questions, visit our FAQ page or explore our conversion guides.
Helpful Conversion Guides
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Other Time Units and Conversions
Explore other time units and their conversion options:
- Second (s) • Minute to Second
- Hour (h) • Minute to Hour
- Day (d) • Minute to Day
- Week (wk) • Minute to Week
- Month (mo) • Minute to Month
- Year (yr) • Minute to Year
- Millisecond (ms) • Minute to Millisecond
- Microsecond (μs) • Minute to Microsecond
- Nanosecond (ns) • Minute to Nanosecond
- Decade (dec) • Minute to Decade
Verified Against Authority Standards
All conversion formulas have been verified against international standards and authoritative sources to ensure maximum accuracy and reliability.
National Institute of Standards and Technology — Official time standards and definitions
Bureau International des Poids et Mesures — Definition of the SI base unit for time
Last verified: December 3, 2025