Nauti Test ProSection guide · Marlins English Language Test for Seafarers
Time and numbers is the smallest section of the Marlins test — 5 questions of 85 for seafarers — and the one where a good candidate loses points for the silliest reasons: half eight heard as 7:30, fifteen typed as 50, a decimal comma, a missing digit in a phone number. This guide shows how times and numbers are spoken on board, how to type them, and the traps to train out before the test.
On its About the tests page Marlins lists, at the time of writing (October 2026), 5 Time and numbers questions in the Seafarers test, 4 in the Cruise Ship Staff test and 6 in the Offshore Workers test. Five points out of 85 is about 6 % of your score — but these are points that a careful candidate should never lose, because there is no grammar to think about: you either heard the number or you did not.
The items come in two forms. In some you hear a short message and choose the time, date or quantity from three or four options. In others — the dictation items — you hear the message and type the number in a box. Our timed simulations (set 1 of each test) mix them in the same way: for Seafarers 3 chosen + 2 typed, for Cruise Ship Staff 2 + 2, for Offshore Workers 4 + 2. Our exam-format Offshore mock has no dictation: on the Offshore screens we studied to build it we saw none, so its six items are all chosen. Our Time & Numbers unit for seafarers has 179 items, 100 of them with a recording.
On board, both clocks are used. A watch officer says "oh four hundred" or "zero four hundred hours"; a steward or an agent on the phone says "four in the morning" or "a quarter past four". The test uses both, and the question tells you which form to type. Read the question before you press play: if it says "four digits on the 24-hour clock", an afternoon time must become 13–23.
| You hear | 24-hour clock · 12-hour clock |
|---|---|
| "oh seven hundred" · "zero seven hundred hours" | 0700 · 7:00 a.m. |
| "twenty past four in the afternoon" | 1620 · 4:20 p.m. |
| "half eight" (in the morning) | 0830 · 8:30 a.m. — half PAST eight |
| "twenty to six in the evening" | 1740 · 5:40 p.m. |
| "a quarter to eleven tonight" | 2245 · 10:45 p.m. |
| "twenty-one fifteen" | 2115 · 9:15 p.m. |
| "midday" · "noon" | 1200 · 12 noon |
| "half past midnight" | 0030 · 12:30 a.m. |
Half eight is half past eight. British speakers often drop the "past". If your language counts the half hour towards the next hour (German halb acht is 7:30, and some other languages do the same), this is the most dangerous phrase in the section. Twenty to and a quarter to count backwards from the next hour: "twenty to six in the evening" is 17:40, not 18:20.
British English says the day first: "the third of March", written 3 March or 3/3. American English writes the month first, so 3/9 can be the 3rd of September or the 9th of March — when a question shows dates in figures, read the words around them. Listen for the ordinal ending: the thirteenth and the thirtieth differ only in stress, exactly like thirteen and thirty. Words that turn into dates: tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, a week on Friday (the Friday after next), a fortnight (two weeks).
British English puts and before the last part of a number: "one thousand two hundred and fifty" is 1,250 — the and is not a separate number. "Two thousand and five" is 2,005, not 2,500. Round numbers are sometimes said in hundreds: "twelve hundred tonnes" is 1,200 tonnes, the same as "one thousand two hundred".
In English the point is the decimal separator and the comma separates thousands. Seafarers from Spain, most of South America, Brazil, Indonesia, Russia and much of Europe write it the other way round. On the test 9,4 is not "nine point four"; 1,460 is one thousand four hundred and sixty. Decimals are read digit by digit after the point: "seven point oh five" is 7.05, and "seven point five" is 7.5. On a bridge you will also hear "decimal": "draught aft nine decimal four" is 9.4 m.
These are read one digit at a time, in groups. Zero is "oh" or "zero"; two equal digits are often "double": "double five" is 55, "triple oh" is 000. A VHF channel is read digit by digit: "channel one six" is 16, "channel seven two" is 72. Courses and bearings are three digits, so a course of 85° is spoken "zero eight five" and typed 085. A position is degrees then minutes: "five one degrees, two three minutes north" is 51° 23′ N.
A dictation item gives you a box and a short instruction, such as "type the time as four digits on the 24-hour clock (for example 0905)" or "type only the number of tonnes". Five rules:
How our practice grades them. Our grader compares the digits only: it ignores the colon, the point and a leading zero, so 630 and 0630 both count. On the items that ask for the 12-hour form, it also accepts the 24-hour form of the same time, because both mean the same moment. We cannot know how strictly the Marlins test reads your answer, so on the day type exactly the form the question asks for — that is always right.
Original items in the format of the test. The script is written as "You hear": ask someone to read it to you at normal speed, twice, and answer before you open the key.
Example 1 · time, choose
You hear: "The surveyor's coming on board at half eight tomorrow morning, so have the hatch covers open by then."
What time will the surveyor arrive?
c. "Half eight" is British English for half past eight. Speakers of languages that say "half" towards the next hour often choose 07:30. Option b ignores the "half".
Example 2 · date, choose
You hear: "Your relief joins in Singapore on the thirteenth of May, and you sign off the day after."
On what date does the seafarer sign off?
b. The relief joins on the thirteenth; "the day after" is the fourteenth. Option a is the date you actually hear — the trap of two dates in one message. Option c is the -teen / -ty confusion: thirTEENth, not THIRtieth.
Example 3 · course, typed
You hear: "Alter course to starboard. New course zero eight five."
Type the new course in degrees as three digits (for example 045).
Type your answer:
085. Courses are three digits, read one by one. Type 085 — not 85°, not "zero eight five". Our grader would also accept 85, but on the day copy the form of the example.
Example 4 · quantity, typed
You hear: "We'll take one thousand two hundred and fifty tonnes of fuel oil from the barge, starting at fourteen hundred."
How much fuel oil will the ship take? Type only the number of tonnes.
Type your answer:
1250. The British "and" joins the parts of one number; it is not 1200 plus 50 typed separately. Leave out "tonnes", and ignore 1400: that is the time, the second number in the message.
Example 5 · phone number, typed
You hear: "You can reach the agent's office on oh two one, double four seven, nine three eight."
Type the telephone number of the agent's office.
Type your answer:
021447938. "Oh" is zero and "double four" is 44, so the groups are 021 · 447 · 938: nine digits. Count them before you move on — a missed "double" leaves you one digit short.
A five-minute daily drill: take any text with numbers — a weather report, a port notice, a football result — and read it aloud in English; then listen to a short news bulletin and write down every number you hear. Check against the written version. After a week, numbers stop needing translation, which is exactly what the test measures.
One guide per section, with the points each one is worth in the Seafarers test:
Every section in one place: how to pass the Marlins test. What score your rank needs: the minimum score by rank. The test and our practice units: the Marlins test page. Free practice, ten questions each: test 1, test 2, test 3, test 4, test 5, test 6.
At the time of writing (October 2026), Marlins' About the tests page lists 5 Time and numbers questions in the Seafarers test (of 85), 4 in the Cruise Ship Staff test (of 50) and 6 in the Offshore Workers test (of 85).
Both. Some items give options; in others you hear a message and type the number in a box. Our timed simulations (set 1 of each test) mix them: 3 chosen and 2 typed for Seafarers, 2 and 2 for Cruise Ship Staff, 4 and 2 for Offshore Workers. Our exam-format Offshore mock has no dictation, because we saw none on the Offshore screens we studied to build it.
The form the question asks for. A question that says "four digits on the 24-hour clock (for example 0905)" wants 0630; one that gives 9:05 as the example wants 6:30. Always type digits, never words, and never the unit.
Do not. In English the point is the decimal separator (9.4) and the comma separates thousands (1,460). Typing 9,4 may be read as a different number. If you are not asked for a separator, leave thousands without one: 1460.
It is not: in British English "half eight" means 8:30. It is a common trap for speakers of languages where "half eight" means 7:30. "Twenty to six" is 5:40 and "a quarter to eleven" is 10:45.
Five minutes a day: read numbers aloud in English (times, dates, prices, phone numbers), then listen to a short news bulletin and write down every number you hear. Practise the -teen / -ty pairs with audio, and do typed dictations until the leading zero and the 24-hour form are automatic.