What time formats are accepted?

24-hour "HH:MM" or "HH:MM:SS", one time per line, such as "14:30" or "09:15:00". A single-digit hour like "9:15" is also accepted.

Does it sort across multiple days, like a full timestamp with a date?

No, every time is treated as occurring within a single 24-hour day, so "23:00" always sorts after "22:00" and before "00:30" of a following day is not represented, there's no date component here at all.

What happens with duplicate times?

Duplicates are kept and sorted next to each other in the order they were entered; nothing is de-duplicated.

Will it accept 12-hour times with AM/PM?

No, only 24-hour "HH:MM" or "HH:MM:SS" is accepted here. Use Clock Time Validator first to check and convert a 12-hour time to 24-hour before sorting.

Clock Time Sorter - Sort a List of Times Chronologically

Overview

Introduction

A list of times pulled from a schedule, log file, or spreadsheet is rarely already in order, and sorting it by hand line by line is tedious and error-prone.

This tool sorts a plain list of clock times chronologically, treating each one as a point within a single day.

What Is Sort Clock Times?

A line-based time sorter: paste one time per line and get the same list back in ascending order.

It works on 24-hour "HH:MM" or "HH:MM:SS" times only, with strict range checking on hours, minutes, and seconds.

How Sort Clock Times Works

Each line is parsed against a 24-hour time pattern and converted to a total-seconds-since-midnight value for comparison.

The original line text is preserved in the output, only the order changes, so "9:15" stays "9:15" rather than being reformatted to "09:15".

When To Use Sort Clock Times

Use it whenever you have a rough or randomly ordered list of times, appointment slots, log timestamps, class periods, and need them in chronological order.

It's also useful as a quick sanity check that a list of times you assembled by hand doesn't have anything out of place.

Often used alongside Sort Time Intervals and Validate a Clock Time.

Features

Advantages

Accepts both HH:MM and HH:MM:SS on the same list without requiring a consistent format across lines.
Preserves each line's original text exactly, so formatting quirks like a leading zero aren't silently changed.
Strict range validation catches an out-of-range hour, minute, or second before sorting rather than misordering around it.

Limitations

No date component, every time is assumed to fall within the same single day.
12-hour AM/PM times are not accepted directly, convert them to 24-hour first.

Examples

Sorting a short list of times

Input

14:30
09:15
23:00

Output

09:15
14:30
23:00

The three times are reordered from earliest to latest within the day.

Best Practices & Notes

Best Practices

Keep one time per line with no trailing commentary, extra text on the same line will fail validation.
Convert any 12-hour AM/PM times to 24-hour format with Clock Time Validator before sorting them alongside 24-hour times.

Developer Notes

Each line is matched against /^(\d{1,2}):(\d{2})(?::(\d{2}))?$/, converted to hours*3600 + minutes*60 + seconds, and sorted with a standard numeric comparator; the original matched string is carried through unchanged so output formatting mirrors input formatting exactly.

Sort Clock Times Use Cases

Ordering a list of meeting or appointment times pulled from an email thread
Sorting log timestamps that were extracted without their date component
Arranging class period or shift start times into a daily schedule

Common Mistakes

Mixing in a 12-hour AM/PM time, which this tool doesn't parse and will reject as invalid.
Leaving blank lines or stray whitespace-only lines in the middle of the list; these are stripped automatically but a line with any non-time text will error.

Tips

If your times represent ranges rather than single points, use Time Interval Sorter instead so both the start and end are kept together.
Run Clock Time Validator on any line the sorter rejects to see exactly what's wrong with it.

Sort Clock Times