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Telling the hours in Japanese

Time table, from Genki 3rd Edition

The unit of an hour is called じ (kanji: 時 / Ji) in Japanese. If you want to say a certain time, you say “number + じ / 時 (ji)”. For example: One o'clock = いちじ (一時) Ichi Ji It's two o'clock =　にじです (ニ時) です Ni Ji Desu Three o'clock = さんじ (三時) San Ji

The chart below, also from Genki, illustrate from one to twelve.

＊Not only 4 (Yoji) is a irregular (it's not YonJi), but also 9 (Kuji) is not it's most common form (Kyuu). In the case of 7, you could either say Shichi (しち) Ji or Nana (なな) Ji. Both are ok, but people tend to avoid Shichi (しち) Ji because it may be confused with Ichi (いち) Ji.

＊時 (ji) is a unit and 時間 (jikan) is a counter for time. So, you use "時 (ji)" when you're telling the hours, as in "It's two and thirty right now", but use "時間 (jikan)" if you're talking about a specific time-frame, as in "It took me two hours to do that".

Now, look at the first chart again. The unit of minutes is called ふん (分 / fun). So, if you want to say "two minutes", you say にふん (二分 / nifun). But, if you want to say "one minute", you say いっぷん (一分 / ippun).

Numbers 1, 6 and 10 all use ぷん (pun) instead of fun;

Numbers 2, 5, 7 and 9 all use ふん (fun);

And numbers 3, 4 and 8 accept both forms.